The Breaking Point
by beeftony
Summary: He never found her. He tried to reach out to her, but forces beyond his control conspired against him and kept her from his grasp. Four years later, she's been delivered to his doorstep. But there's something different about her...
1. No Questions Part I

_Tick, tock. Tick, tock._

He listened to the clock ticking sharply on the wall, counting the seconds as they brought him closer to the moment of his death. He knew the purpose of the noise. It acted as a focus for the patient's attention, to keep their mind on the passing of the seconds, minutes, hours, days and weeks instead of the tired madness that lingered inside their head. It was an instrument of distraction.

That was the only reason to use an analog clock when so many digital alternatives existed. They could have printed the time on the inside of his eyelids if they wished. Instead they decided to give him a face to look at. Something to remind him that his time was running out.

Not for the first time, he took in the spartan surroundings of what was supposed to be a room. No, not a room. A cell. A cage to keep him well-behaved. The bed he sat on was bolted to the floor, too low to crawl under. The floor was hard and unbreakable, as were the clinical white walls. Across from him was an assortment of shapes cut into the wall, where his toilet would emerge from whenever he needed to use it. Other than that, the cell was barren. There was not even a handle on the door.

He sighed and stared into the blazing halogen above him, closing his eyes just before he went blind. The remnants of the light painted the inside of his eyelids, and he tried to imagine what they might look like if they hadn't simply been artifacts on his retinas from staring at a source of light for too long. Just like clouds.

His sister had always been better at that.

He sighed and turned halfway over, feeling the sheetrock these people called a mattress pushing hard against his hips and shoulder. He stared at the hidden toilet, wondering if he should use it.

No, he decided. He wasn't ready to move yet. So much planning to do, and so little time. He had been running out for a while now.

The door hissed open, intruding on his thoughts. He barely even reacted, keeping his position and flicking his eyes toward the figure entering the room.

"Simon Tam," he said. His words were not a question; they knew who he was.

"What is it?" he murmured, lying flat on his back.

"Get up," the man ordered. "Someone here to see you."

Simon groaned and lifted himself to his feet.

They walked through the hall, which managed to seem unfamiliar even after all this time. This wasn't home. There was no home without her.

He glared daggers at the man in front of him. For a moment he considered reaching forward, clasping a hand over his mouth and crushing his windpipe. It would only take eight pounds of force to collapse the narrow tube that carried breath down his neck, and from there he could escape. He could find her at last.

Simon quashed the notion. That train of thought always ended the same way. There were people in the hall. Doctors, nurses, patients just like him. Witnesses. They would see what he had done, and then he would be taken away for punishment. He had to be on his best behavior. That was the only way they were ever going to let him go.

"This way."

They turned left, into the waiting room. This was as far as he ever ventured into the hospital's psychiatric ward before it had become his home. What struck him as odd was that he had never gotten that far since. Usually they continued straight ahead until they reached the visitor's room. The volume of people in here was almost overwhelming, with patients coming and going, families saying goodbye as their loved ones were led off to experience the thrilling adventure of staring at a white room all day.

"Here he comes!" an excited voice shrieked as he drew closer. It was one he thought he'd never hear again, not that he wanted to. They had stopped being part of his life ever since they left him here to rot so that they could go off and enjoy their dinner parties without being embarrassed. Simon scowled.

"Mother," he greeted in a formal, clipped tone to send the message that he was more unhappy than surprised to see them. He looked at the other figure. "Father."

Gabriel Tam sighed, a ghost of a smile on his face. "Simon."

"I thought you said you wouldn't come for me," he snapped, throwing the man's words from long ago back in his face.

He rolled his eyes. "Simon, you've been opening with that every time we've visited for the last four years. Try saying 'hello' once in a while."

"Just making sure you remembered," he said coldly. "You're early this year. I suppose you have exciting news?" He let the sarcasm coat his words like a fine sauce.

"Actually, yes," the woman who called herself his mother answered. "You're being released."

Simon blinked, but kept his icy glare pointed at them. "Well, that's wonderful news," he responded in a voice that implied he believed the opposite. "Now I can be a productive member of society again."

"Yes, you can," said his father. "Although, I will be honest with you, it wasn't my idea."

"Didn't think it was."

His father glared. "Will you shut up and be grateful? You've been in here four years and this is how you react to getting set free?"

"I'm sorry," he said, his tone suggesting he was everything but. "I'm sure I must have made quite a mark on your reputation. This must be an awful risk for you."

He held up a hand. "You know what, I'm not getting into this argument with you. You're my son, and the doctors have given you a full release. You're perfectly sane as far as they're concerned. Let's go home."

Simon chuckled. "I don't have a home."

"What? Don't be ridiculous!" his mother protested. "You know we'd never abandon you!"

"I haven't seen you in eight months," he argued. "And even then you only came by to see if I was sane enough not to embarrass you anymore. At least here, people actually _listen_ to me when I talk."

"Well, you're sane now," his father said, proving his point. "And you don't have to come home for us. There's someone else who's excited to see you."

Simon leaned forward. "Dad," he hissed, using the term like an insult. "I don't give a good _gorram_ what high class socialite is waiting at home to see your little success story. The only person I want to see is—"

"Right behind you."

He froze. Neither of them had said that. He turned around slowly and looked into a face that he never thought he would see again.

She was exactly like he remembered, but at the same time she had changed so much. Her long dark hair was combed straight by what Simon was sure was the best salon on Osiris. She was small, but her muscles were lean and toned, meaning her strength was hidden. She wore a black, form-hugging dress that started to billow around her waist, cutting off just above her ankles, and an opal necklace rested in the middle of her chest, just above the fabric. Her arms were bare save a bracelet on her left that matched her necklace. Her ears were adorned with simple diamond studs. She looked glamorous, but not overly ostentatious. Her natural beauty was what gave the outfit its magic. The brilliant smile on her face would have put a star to shame.

"River?" he asked, wondering for a moment if this was real. After a moment, he decided he didn't care. "River!" he shouted, rushing forward and wrapping his ninety pound sister in a hug. She giggled as he swept her off her feet, spinning her around. He set her down after two rotations, then his mission came rushing back to him.

"Are you okay?" he whispered, covering her cheeks with his hands. "Did they hurt you?"

She cocked her head to the side, then squinted at him like she had the time he decided it would be his mission in life to grow a mustache. "What are you talking about, Simon?"

"The Academy," he answered as though she would understand perfectly. "I got your letters, I worked out the code. You told me they were hurting you."

River blinked and then smiled dismissively. "Simon, you always worry about me."

He stepped back, stunned. In what universe was that an appropriate response to what he had said? River was acting differently than the bratty little sister he remembered. _Too_ differently.

"River?" he asked cautiously. "What happened to you?"

"Nothing," she insisted, still smiling in a way that made him uneasy. It sort of reminded him of how his parents always smiled when they were being condescending.

"Well that's a relief," he lied, deciding to go with it. She didn't need to know what he'd gone through.

"Didn't see me for seven years," she said suddenly, her tone becoming distant. Simon got the feeling that she was looking past him even though their eyes were locked. "Worried about me. Went to the bottom feeders because the upper crust wouldn't help. But you didn't need to. Nothing happened."

This was even stranger, he realized. Her response was different from before, and it wasn't exactly a reply, because he hadn't asked a question. He considered that she might be acting differently because he hadn't seen her in so long. Had it really been seven years? That would make her...

"Twenty one," River told him, beaming. "Old enough to take you out on the town."

Simon just stared. He hadn't asked her how old she was.

"You can do that later," their father said from behind him. Simon turned around. "Right now we need to get you home so you can get freshened up. There's a big dinner tonight, and you're the guest of honor."

"I'm flattered," he deadpanned, then turned back to River. "I missed you so much."

"Missed you too," she replied warmly. "We'd better get home now. You'll miss the dinner otherwise."

"Right," he said, feeling that the way she'd spoken that last sentence wasn't quite right. Still, she was back. That meant he could go back as well. There was no longer anything to fear. He looked at their parents. "Wouldn't want to miss that."

His father smiled. "Come on, son," he said, and Simon let himself accept that title for the first time in years. "Let's go home."

* * *

**Episode One**  
Ask Me No Questions...

* * *

The house was just like he remembered it, despite his best efforts to purge the place from his mind. It was by no means a mansion, but it was definitely upper class, better than most people on Osiris could afford. Simon had always hated that. It wasn't that he felt sorry for those who were unable to live in luxury—that was hardly their own fault, and they were still on a Core planet where they could survive well enough. What bothered him was that the people who did have money never seemed to appreciate it. They took it for granted, just like everything else in their easy, sanitary lives.

They'd never had to risk everything to save someone. They had never been locked up for trying to find the truth. They had never understood what it meant to know that someone they loved was being hurt and that they could do nothing to stop it.

Simon had done all those things. Now, however, he wasn't so sure it had been necessary. River was _fine_. More than fine, actually. The ride home from the hospital had been spent asking her what _had_ happened at the Academy if he was wrong about her supposed message. She had told him of the magnificent education she received, wowing him with facts and numbers that went far beyond his not inconsiderable knowledge. The whole time, she had never stopped smiling.

Something about that unsettled him, though he supposed that he was still having trouble adjusting to the reality of the situation. There had never been anything wrong with the Academy. He had just taken his overprotective big brother tendencies to the extreme, and they had locked him up for four years because of it. There was nothing to be afraid of now.

He crossed the threshold and stepped into the living room. In front of him to his right there was a long black leather couch where he and River had been trapped behind enemy lines, trying to deal with the dinosaurs that the Independents had sent their way. His father had sat across from them and made him promise to become a brilliant doctor, just so he could justify their mother spending a few credits on a dedicated source box. This was the same room where he had tried to convince them of River's code, and the spot where he was standing now was the same spot where they had told him he worried far too much for his own good.

Simon sighed and let the memories flow away. The past was over with. It was time to focus on the future.

The rest of the room hadn't changed much. The dark walnut furniture still stood imposingly in various spots, and the clear glass coffee table separated the couch from the rest of the chairs. Beside the furniture was a fireplace, extinguished for now. A hallway leading out of the room rested to the left of the fireplace, beyond which Simon knew there was a set of stairs leading up to the second level of the house.

"We kept your room the same," his mother told him.

"Go get dressed in your best tux and then come back down here," his father ordered. "The dinner starts in half an hour."

He nodded absently and walked past the couch, wondering why they hadn't said the same to River. She was already dressed formally enough, he supposed, which was odd considering she had accompanied them to pick him up from the hospital. She also must have already seen her room, since they hadn't mentioned that either. How long had she been back?

"A couple days," she said behind him as she followed him out of the room. "You missed my dinner."

A powerful mixture of indignation and shame hit him quickly enough that he barely noticed that he hadn't asked her that out loud. "Sorry about that," he replied, sparing her the sarcasm he would have used on just about anyone else. "How did it go?"

"Okay," she spoke quietly. "Wished you were there."

"So do I," he answered, leaving out the part where his parents probably just didn't want their respective homecomings to get in the way of each other. Separate dinners were the solution that worked out best for their tastes. They probably didn't even realize that he wouldn't have cared if River had gotten all of his attention. It wasn't like he wanted it anyway.

"You never liked the spotlight," she told him suddenly, and he paused at the stairs with one leg on the first step. "Always figured it should go to the best dancer. But you can't stay backstage forever. You're on in five."

He turned around and stared at her, wondering where that pile of gibberish had come from. "What?"

"Go get dressed," she clarified. "We need to leave soon." River turned around and strode quietly back to the living room.

Simon shook his head and started climbing the stairs. It wasn't the metaphor that confused him; it was how eerily close it related to what he had been thinking. It was almost like River had been reading his mind.

He chuckled as he reached the top of the stairs, dismissing that notion. He deserved to be locked up again if he was considering things like that. His sister had always been extremely intuitive, to the point of genius. She could probably just read what was written all over his face.

Five minutes later he descended the stairs, fumbling with his bow tie. He had never liked formal wear even before his wardrobe had been replaced entirely by white cotton. He managed to get it halfway decent by the time he rounded the corner back into the living room. River stood up from the couch and started fiddling with it immediately.

Simon rolled his eyes and let out a big sigh for show, even though he was secretly grateful that his sister knew what she was doing. Her small hands darted and weaved, twisting the glorified ribbon into the perfect shape in a matter of seconds. Simon smiled to show his appreciation. "Thanks."

"You're welcome."

Their parents exchanged a smile, then stood up as well. "Let's get going," his father said.

* * *

They arrived at the dinner twenty five minutes later. They had rented a hall with a dance floor, and though the attire was formal, it was not quite a ball. The table where they would be eating rested beyond a set of double doors that would not be opened for at least an hour. That meant he would have to interact with people, which Simon had gotten quite used to not doing over the last four years.

The room was enormous, he noticed as they walked along the hallway approaching it. There was plenty of space to dance, and the tables surrounding it were littered with hors douvres. The floor was polished stone, intricate designs set into it with a slight tan color that matched the walls of the room. Tapestries adorned the walls, woven just as impressively. Above them, several chandeliers floated by themselves. Classical music surrounded them, meant to put them at ease. It had the opposite effect on Simon, who was reminded of the clock that was designed to do the same thing.

His parents and River were announced first, and he hung back for the moment. The guest of honor was always announced separately.

"Dr. Simon Tam!"

The room was filled with a series of quiet claps as all eyes turned toward him. He managed a weak smile and wave, then broke off from his family to mingle. A number of hands shook his, and Simon let the guests introduce themselves, only intent on remembering their names for the extent of the evening.

There was, however, one person besides his family that he already knew. Excusing himself from a man whom he was fairly certain was a baron or some such, he strode toward her with a confident gait, his lips curling faintly upward. When he reached her, he put a hand across his stomach and bowed slightly in greeting.

The woman replied with equal formality, gripping the sides of her bright red form-fitting dress and dipping in a short curtsy. She smiled back at him.

"Hello," he said.

Earth That Was had been comprised of many nations, much like the planets had operated before the Unification War. The Alliance had been founded by two such nations: The United States of America and The People's Republic of China. A number of people on Osiris had ancestry in both nations, including the Tams. However, it didn't often show, especially at this level of society. River was the closest, having slightly darker skin than the rest of their family, but the woman in front of him could have easily been mistaken for full-blooded Chinese.

Alecia Chen continued to smile. "Hello, Simon."

"You're enjoying the dinner, I take it?"

"It was kind of a slow party until you got here," she answered without a whisper of an accent. Simon had heard stories from River about how Chinese people on Earth That Was had supposedly been impossible to understand when speaking English, due to the differences between their languages. Five hundred years had changed things, and only planets like Sihnon still practiced that culture with any sort of seriousness. The rest of the galaxy only used their language for various curses that were not polite to say in English. Which was ironic, because the Chinese had been civilized thousands of years before their eventual allies.

Simon shook his head to interrupt the history lesson that was running through his brain. "Parties on Osiris are always slow," he replied with just a hint of a smirk. "At least in this tax bracket."

They shared a laugh. "Well, you're just going to have to grin and bear it," she told him, poking a finger in his direction. "It has to be more exciting than where you've been for the last four years."

His smile vanished. "How much do you know about that?"

"Only what I've heard," she told him. "They said you went crazy looking for your sister."

"I thought she was in danger," Simon explained, going stiff. How much had people said about him while he was away? He didn't much care about their opinion, but he knew how these people worked, and if they were gossiping about that in front of River, or worse, saying things directly to her, then that was something he couldn't live with. Her opinion still mattered to him, and he didn't want it damaged by stupid rumors. Even if they _were_ true.

"What kind of danger?" she asked, taking a sip of a drink she had just received off a tray. Simon took one as well.

"I'm still not sure," he answered, the alcohol helping him to loosen a bit. "Though I suppose it doesn't matter now, since according to her, nothing happened."

"Mm," she nodded, still swallowing her next sip. "Well I'm glad to hear that."

"So was I. I'm beginning to think it was her idea to get me released."

"What do you mean?"

"You've met my parents before, so I'm sure you know how much they hate being embarrassed," he explained. "That's why I stayed there for four years while they went off to dinner parties. Although I must admit, part of me wishes I was still in there if it meant I could avoid things like this."

"Catching up with old friends?" she challenged, and Simon backpedaled quickly.

"That's… that's not what I meant," he corrected. "I meant dinner parties. Dinner parties are boring. I hate seeing people at dinner parties." Her eyebrows rose again. "Except you! You I'm glad to see."

She laughed. "Simon, I'm just kidding with you," she explained, and he rolled his eyes.

"I thought this would finally be the time where I talked to you without tripping over myself," he muttered.

Alecia smiled and gently placed a hand on his arm. "It's getting pretty boring just standing here," she told him. "Wanna dance?"

"I'd be delighted," he told her, setting his drink down on a passing tray. She did the same, and they joined hands, then moved toward the dance floor.

It was a simple dance, and he still remembered the steps after all these years. Alecia led, as she was the better dancer between the two of them. Neither of them compared to River, whom Simon noticed was leaning over a bowl of punch like it would grant her deepest wishes. He smiled at that, nearly tripping from the distraction. Alecia managed to catch him.

"Careful," she admonished, and Simon felt the blood vessels in his cheeks dilate, or at the very least he felt the sudden spike of warmth that resulted from the blush. He fell back into step with her after a moment, and took the lead.

Simon lifted his arm up, and she spun around twice before he pulled her back in close, leaning forward while she arched her back and lifted one leg off the floor, extending past his thigh. He supported her with steady arms, then pulled her back up a second later. Their hands locked, and they continued stepping in time with the music.

His steps were quick and precise, while hers were more flowing and relaxed. She had an air of grace about her that reminded Simon of his sister, though she was a lot more elegant than the bratty little savant he'd do anything to protect. He felt awkward here, but Alecia _belonged_. That aura and poise was what had drawn him to her in the first place, so many years ago.

"You're doing well," she complimented, and he smiled graciously.

"I always did have a knack for memorizing procedures."

"I didn't say you were doing _great_," she replied, smirking. "Loosen up a little. You don't have to get everything exactly right. Try and _feel_ the music, put your own little touch on it."

He frowned. "River's better at doing that than I am," he told her. "I'm kind of hoping she'll get out here soon so I can see how she's improved. I haven't seen her dance in seven years."

"Neither has anyone else," she revealed. "She mostly kept to herself when your parents threw a dinner for her."

The music changed, and they settled into a different dance. This one was slower, and Simon put an arm around her waist, pulling her closer. She put a hand on each of his shoulders and they swayed back and forth while slowly rotating.

"Really?"

She nodded. "I don't know why they threw that one before you got out. She really seemed disappointed that you weren't there."

"Like I said, my parents don't like to be embarrassed," he told her. "I've been out of polite society for four years. River's been gone even longer than that. They'd never be able to handle throwing a homecoming dinner for both of us at once."

"Are you saying they were worried you'd take all the attention away from River?"

He blinked, not having considered that angle. He'd thought his parents were concerned about the opposite. "Well, if it was," he replied. "Then it would be one of the rare cases where I actually agree with them. She deserves to be focused on."

"She doesn't seem to think so," Alecia told him. "I think what she wanted the most was just to see her brother again. Nobody else's attention really seems to matter to her."

Simon let those words hit him, then lowered his head. "How do you figure?"

"Well, for one thing, she's smiling at us right now."

He looked behind him to see River staring at them with a broad grin plastered on her face. It was a look of genuine happiness, one he hadn't seen since they day she left for the Academy. From what he saw in her letters, he'd feared he would never see her smile like that again. But it was becoming increasingly clearer that he had been wrong.

Simon returned the smile and gestured toward the dance floor with his head. She shook her head back at him and continued to stare, sipping her punch.

He turned back to Alecia just in time to catch her smile. "I don't think she wants to dance right now," she opined. "It's too slow for her."

"That makes sense," he agreed. "She never did seem to like formal dancing." The happiest he had ever seen his sister was when she danced by herself in the backyard.

They continued to dance for a few more minutes and finally walked off the floor, taking a seat at one of the tables.

"That was fun," Alecia told him, and he grinned. "Thank you."

"My pleasure." He looked away and frowned, realizing something. "I've been so rude. We've been talking about my life so much and I haven't even asked you how you've been doing."

Alecia laughed out loud. "That's because I _wanted_ to talk about you, silly," she chided. "I haven't seen you in four years."

"Well, I haven't seen you in four years either," the doctor countered. "What have you been up to?"

"Working, mostly. We just finished closing up a smuggling operation on Persephone. Didn't catch the people who hired them, even though I'm pretty sure I know who it is."

Simon nodded. Even though she didn't look like it in her fine silk dress, Alecia was a Federal Investigator working for the Alliance. Their families were old friends, and she only showed up at social functions like these because she was expected to. She had enough money that she could afford not to work a single day in her life, but Alecia had never been one for decadence. She liked putting that extremely sharp mind of hers to use, bringing criminals to justice through the power of thinking.

"Who's that?"

"Fellow named Badger. Wears a crappy suit with a nice hat. I can never manage to link anything back to him, even though we've been busting his smuggling rings for years. He's a clever man; always finds someone else to pin the blame on."

"Sounds dangerous."

"Oh, he usually doesn't bother us if we don't bother him. He thinks of himself as a servant of the community, someone who has his ear to the street. He likes to call himself a proper businessman, but that business involves smuggling, racketeering, slavery and prostitution, plus a number of other things that I can never quite seem to trace back to him."

"Have you ever met him?"

"Once," she admitted. "The one time he actually got arrested, I was the one who led the interrogation. Only reason he's not still behind bars is because he took the deal we offered him like a rat to cheese. Turned twenty percent of his smugglers over to us."

"Sounds like a real trustworthy guy," Simon deadpanned. "So if he's still out there then why did you come back to Osiris?"

"Tracking one of his shipments, actually," she answered. "We have reason to believe he hired the crew of a Firefly to run some goods this far into the Core. I've been looking into it ever since I got back."

"And since you were in the neighborhood, you figured you'd accept my parents' invitation," he realized.

Alecia smiled. "Yep."

"I didn't know they still ran Fireflies," he said, steering the conversation back.

"Official shipping companies don't," she confirmed. "Smugglers tend to prefer them because of the open design and hidden compartments. They're really tough, too. I've heard stories of those ships outliving their owners."

"A lot of smuggling ships tend to have that reputation," Simon pointed out. "What kind of cargo are they moving?"

"Can't talk about that," she warned. "Classified."

"Ah," he replied, understanding that she'd told him plenty more than she should have already, and the conversation ended.

They sat there watching the people for a minute, then Simon noticed a small figure moving out to the dance floor. The people were twirling around with their hands joined like a human carousel, and she slid among them perfectly. The carousel broke off after a moment, and she danced with a random stranger who looked like he was having trouble keeping up. She abandoned him a second later and moved onto another guest.

"She's good," Alecia told him, and he nodded without taking his eyes off River.

"Yes," he agreed. "She's very good."

He sighed and relaxed, letting the weight of the world roll off his shoulders. At least there was one bright spot to this whole affair, and he planned to enjoy it for as long as he could. River was safe, and he started to wonder if she'd ever been in danger in the first place. Finally, after all those years spent worrying, he could be at peace.

Simon let all the worries of the last seven years fade away to the back of his mind, and watched his sister dance.

* * *

Dinner was announced some time later, and the guests filed through to their spots at the table. Alecia excused herself and went to find her family, while Simon did the same. His father was the first person he ran into, and he was talking to two other people: a middle-aged gentleman that he recognized as the Chief of Medicine, and one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen. He turned and smiled when he saw his son approach, and indicated him to the couple.

"Simon, you remember Dr. White," he said, then turned to address the woman. "This is my son, Simon."

"Pleasure to meet you," the woman greeted, stepping forward to shake his hand. Simon accepted it, and was amazed at the softness of her skin. Up close like this, he could smell incense. Her hair was dark and wavy, and her skin was a golden color that suggested she hailed from a planet like Sihnon. She wore an elegant gold dress that did a remarkable job of emphasizing her body while still covering up everything except her arms. She had an elegance about her that reminded him of someone else he'd spent most of the evening conversing with, only she seemed even more graceful. "You can call me Inara."

"Pleasure to meet you as well," he replied, inclining his head. "How long have you known Dr. White?"

She smiled widely. "Only today. He's rented me out for the evening."

"Oh, I forgot to tell you," his father said. "Inara here is a registered Companion. One of the best in the 'verse."

"Ah," Simon replied, then looked at the man who had contracted her. "I assume Dr. White's wife couldn't be here this evening?"

He hid his smirk at the deer-in-headlights expression that the doctor adopted, and ignored the glare coming from his father. Pointing out things like that in the presence of polite company was one of the things Simon took great joy in.

If she was offended, Inara didn't show it. She smiled gracefully. "Dr. White only requested that I attend this party with him," she explained. "None of my other services are required."

"I see," he replied, catching the relieved expressions from the other two men. "Well, it was a pleasure meeting you, but I'm afraid that dinner's been called." He looked at his father. "I think we'd better be going."

"Yes, I think that would be best," Gabriel said. "Enjoy the dinner."

"I believe we shall," Inara replied.

As soon as they were far enough away, Simon's father whirled on him. "What the hell was that?" he hissed. "I was trying to get you hired back at the hospital. Now you've ruined any chance at that!"

And just like that, the good mood that had been gradually building up all night fell from its precarious perch, and shattered on the metaphorical stone floor.

"Sorry dad," he remarked mock-innocently. "I was just _very_ curious as to why my former Chief of Medicine would rather hire a Companion than take his wife out anywhere."

"Well so was I, but you didn't hear _me_ pointing it out!"

Simon knew the only reason his father hadn't punched him yet was because of the people around them. He decided to push his luck. "Of course not. How could you when you were trying to sew your lips to his _pi gu_?"

He saw his father's nostrils flare, but he stayed his hand. "Damn it, I'm trying to get you your life back. But you insist on fighting me every step of the way."

"_My_ life?" Simon challenged. "Or the life you _chose_ for me? As I recall, you wanted me to become a brilliant doctor just so you could justify Mom buying me a dedicated source box."

"But look how successful you were at that," he insisted. "And you could have been successful again if you hadn't just embarrassed Dr. White in front of—"

"The Companion he rented for the evening? Or are you upset because I was embarrassing _you_?"

Gabriel said nothing.

"Or maybe you'd rather I never went looking for River in the first place," he accused. "Maybe you were embarrassed to have a mental patient for a son."

"Damn right I was embarrassed about that!" he whispered loudly. "You went insane over _nothing_. River's back now, and she's perfectly fine. I'm just trying to do some damage control, but you keep burning all your bridges."

"Damage control," Simon repeated. "You're saying I've damaged your life somehow? Would you rather I went back there? You said it wasn't your idea to let me out."

"It was never up to me," he snarled. "The doctors cleared you for release, and we came to get you. Your sister wanted to see you again."

"And I wanted to see her a lot sooner than that," he rebutted. By now almost everybody had disappeared into the dining room, leaving them out there more or less alone. "But you already told me what you thought of that."

"Simon..."

"As far as I'm concerned, you stopped being my father the moment you said you wouldn't come for me if I got myself in trouble again," he declared. "I'm only here for River."

He strode off toward the dining room, and his father followed shortly thereafter.

Simon didn't pay attention to the people as he passed them. He moved around to the head of the table, not pausing to sit. He vaguely recognized the fact that River and his mother were sitting on either side of him. He grabbed his glass and tapped a knife against it, which got everybody's attention.

"A toast," he began and raised his glass, ignoring his father as he sat down next to him. "To everyone who came here tonight. Thank you for all your... very fine moral support. I don't deserve this."

He paused for a moment. "I'm sure you've all heard by now where I've been for the last four years," he said, and the rest of the room just stared. "I was there just this morning in fact, and I guess I'm still having trouble adjusting back to my former life because I honestly can't drum up enough reasons to care who most of you are or... why you're really here." He let those words sink in before he said anything else.

"Obviously I appreciate the efforts of some of you," he continued, gesturing his glass toward Alecia and River, while pointedly avoiding his parents. "And I'm sure the rest of you heard there was going to be free food and you just came running." He was the only one who laughed at that joke. "But I had a few revelations during my time away, and I'd like to share them with you."

The room was dead silent. None of them had been expecting this. "Now, some of you may know a little about why I ended up where I was, but you probably don't know the full story. The truth is, I can be a bit of a worrier when it comes to my sister here," he said, indicating River. "Seven years ago, she went off to attend an Academy. She tells me it was a great experience, and I'm sure the program there is just marvelous."

His voice took on a darker tone. "A year later, I started getting letters from her. Letters that made no sense. She was talking about things that never happened, jokes that she insisted we used to tell each other but that I had never heard before. So, in my _infinite_ genius, I decided it was a code. It said, 'They're hurting us. Get me out.'"

Nobody moved. Their glasses were frozen where they had raised them at the beginning of the toast. "I went to my parents to get that help, but they wouldn't believe me. It took two years before I could even get in a position to help her, and I got arrested before I could find out anything concrete." He smiled. "A little while after that, I went crazy."

His parents were doing nothing to silence him. He knew it was because they feared creating even more embarrassment for themselves if they moved against him in such a public setting. For the moment, he was only making a fool of himself. That was about to change.

"I didn't see River again until today," he continued. "When she told me nothing happened to her at the Academy and I realized that I'd been worrying over nothing this whole time, I was a bit confused. You might even say I went crazy again." He chuckled.

"What does it all mean?" he asked. "The parties and the words exchanged? What does it accomplish? Why is it that everybody's so scared of embarrassing themselves that they're afraid to point out the obvious? Like when a man hires a Companion for the evening instead of taking his wife out on a date." He pointed to Dr. White, who looked as though he wished he could melt into his chair. Inara glanced away. "And nobody says anything. "Why? Why is it so _gorram_ important that we be _polite_?"

No one answered him. "I'll tell you why," he said. "It's because the moment we stop thinking about inane things like dinner parties and fashion, and expand our focus to what's really going on in the universe, well... we go a little crazy. Everyone knows the story of the Reavers, how they flew out to the edge of space and saw that nothing was there. Well, that's how I'm feeling tonight. I look at you people and I see... nothing."

He let that thought sit with them for a minute, then raised his glass. "Cheers," he declared, emptying the glass in one gulp. Before anyone could reply, he walked away.

* * *

Simon strode quickly as he exited the building, out into the courtyard of the complex. Skyscrapers loomed overhead, and he could see the traffic in neat lanes that belied the chaos broiling below. His bowtie came undone as he yanked on it with all his might, then hung loosely around his neck.

"Dr. Tam."

He froze, then turned slowly around to address the voice. Of all the people he expected to come charging out those doors, someone he had just met that night was the very last person he was prepared for.

"Inara," he said, letting the Companion walk closer to him. "What are you doing out here?"

"Well, since you made that comment about Dr. White in front of everybody, I no longer have any reason to be in there," she answered, her features set in a disapproving glare.

Simon flushed as he realized what he'd done. "I'm sorry. I never meant to insult you."

She rolled her eyes. "Oh please, you didn't insult me. Dr. White was embarrassed enough to insist I leave, though, so here we are."

"I'm still sorry that you won't be getting your paycheck for the evening," he said sheepishly, and to his surprise, Inara smiled.

"Money doesn't concern me so much," she replied. "I don't imagine you care for it either, judging by what you did back there." She grinned. "Especially that part about seeing nothing when you looked at them, that was good."

A smile seemed to appear on its own at the sudden compliment. "I had four years to work on it," he said. "Being away from high society for long enough tends to make one wonder what the point is."

Inara smiled back. "That reminds me of someone else I know," she told him, glancing down for a brief moment. "Although he was never raised in the upper class to begin with, so he's even worse. This one time he punched a man flat on his back and didn't understand he'd gotten himself into a duel until about thirty seconds later."

"_Why_ did he punch him?" he asked, suddenly curious.

"Defending my honor," she answered, rolling her eyes. "What's weird is that he doesn't even see my profession as being honorable. He thinks I'm just another example of there being one rule for the rich and another for everyone else. Not a day goes by where he doesn't call me a whore."

Simon wondered why she smiled at that.

"I don't imagine you're going anywhere special after that outburst," she said suddenly, and he shook his head.

"My parents haven't exactly been there for me for the last few years," he admitted. "The only reason I'm here tonight is because of River."

"Your sister?"

He nodded. "I'd do anything for her. The only regret I have right now is that I left her back there to deal with that."

"But it's not like you can go back in, is it?"

Simon shook his head.

"Do you want a ride? My shuttle's not far from here."

"Thank you, but no," he replied politely. "I have nowhere to go anyway."

She nodded, understanding, then reached into her dress. More specifically, she reached into the bra underneath. When her hands emerged, she was holding something very odd.

"Those aren't credits," he observed as she passed him a handful of coins. "Why are you handing me platinum?"

"I'm not strictly high society," Inara told him. "I know that if you're looking to go nowhere, you'll need that."

He nodded. "Thank you." He had spent too much time railing against forced politeness to refuse what she was offering him.

"Good luck, Doctor," the Companion told him, then started walking past. "I hope I'll see you again."

"Me too."

As soon as she was out of sight, Simon stuffed the money in his pocket and started walking nowhere.

* * *

Simon stepped quickly to the side as he passed through the doorway, narrowly avoiding a large man in black leather. Smoke assaulted his nostrils as he walked further inside, hanging in the air like a dense fog despite the atmosphere processors. People really liked to smoke in here.

And of course, where there was second-hand smoke, there was usually alcohol. The bar gradually revealed itself to Simon, a lone island surrounded by tables and people who preferred to keep their faces down. The counter itself was oval-shaped, occupying the center of the room. A wide assortment of cheap liquor adorned the cabinets behind it, and a single bartender waited on the patrons pouring the liquid down their throats.

It wasn't the sort of place for one of the brightest doctors on Osiris, much less the son of such a wealthy family, but that was the point. He didn't want to be that person right now.

He sighed, careful not to breathe too deeply in the thick smoke. This wasn't the first time he'd been here. This was where he'd been arrested four years ago, trying to find out what happened to his sister. He doubted the man would be here this time. From what Simon had heard he'd fled the planet years ago. That wasn't why he was here. River was safe.

Simon had come here because it was the last place anybody would think to look for him. That was exactly where he wanted to be.

The bar was located in one of Osiris' many blackout zones, meaning that it had no connection to the Cortex. That made it the perfect place for criminals and the like to hang out without being bothered by the Alliance. Even being here was considered grounds for arrest for someone of his social status, since it was assumed that the only reason such a wealthy citizen would choose to interact with the less than reputable people here would be for illegal purposes. The last time he'd been here, that had been a fair assumption. Now, however, he was only here for a drink.

"Beer, please," he said politely as he stepped up to the counter. The barkeep nodded and went to fetch a glass. He heard a grunt next to him, and looked over.

The man was enormous; tall, muscular, and vaguely ape-like. His hair was short and brown, and his mouth was surrounded by a moustache and beard combo that made it impossible to tell where one ended and the other began. He was eyeing Simon with a raised eyebrow.

"The hell you dressed like that for?" he muttered, and Simon adopted a confused look of his own.

"I beg your pardon?"

"You get married or somethin'?" the man-ape clarified, taking a swig of his whiskey.

"Well, if I had, I'm sure this is the first place I'd bring her on our lovely honeymoon," he deadpanned just as his drink arrived. He fished out some of the coins that Inara had given him and set them down on the counter, which the barkeep took before tending to the next customer.

The concept of sarcasm seemed lost on the man. "Funeral?"

"That would explain why I need a drink, but no," he answered. "I just came from a dinner party."

"A what?"

"Dinner party," he repeated. "It's a social event where people dress up and dance for a while before eating something that's barely recognizable as food." He took a sip of the beer, trying not to grimace as the warm alcohol slid down his throat. "You should come to one, I'm sure you'd fit in wonderfully."

The man grunted and took another sip of his whiskey.

"The dinner was in my honor," he continued, taking the man's silence as a license to continue. "But I've never felt so out of place. Not even here. At least here people are honest about it when they don't like you."

"Hey, Tuxedo Man, did I ask for your life story?" he growled. "Folk don't come here to philosophize about things. Just come here to get drunk an' pick up women."

"Case in point," Simon replied, gesturing. "I don't imagine you like me very much."

"Good imagination," he grunted.

"So then why did you ask me why I was wearing this?"

The man looked at Simon like his hair had suddenly transformed into Christmas trees. "Wanted to know," he answered eventually.

"But you didn't want to know who I am, why I'm here, what reason I could possibly have to still be wearing this even though I feel like it's choking the life out of me?"

He shrugged and took another sip of his drink. "Nope."

Simon briefly considered replying to that before turning back to his own drink.

It was silent for the next few minutes as Simon drank and soaked up the atmosphere of the bar. The man stayed where he was, and they didn't bother each other. Out of nowhere, he felt a tap on his shoulder, and Simon whirled around instantly to find himself face to face with someone he never expected to see in a place like this.

"Found you," she said playfully.

"River?" he asked cautiously, not certain how she had gotten in here. Then he remembered how old she was now. "River, this isn't a good place for you. You should leave."

"Not a good place for you either," she rebutted. "You're not leaving."

"That's... different," he tried to explain, and did a poor job of it.

"You're hiding," she accused, and Simon knew she was right on the money. "But I found you. Mom and Dad are worried."

"I don't care about that," he insisted, though he doubted his words. He finished his drink, then called the bartender over for another.

"You're lying," she said. "But it's not because you value their feelings. You want them to worry."

He faced her again, wondering exactly how she had deciphered his motives when he hadn't even considered that himself. "What are you talking about?"

"They didn't pay attention to you while you were inside," she explained, her eyes and voice oddly distant. "They didn't listen when you tried to warn them. You're acting out because you know it's the only way you can affect them."

"River, I don't think—"

"Bad liar," she interrupted before he could even finish rebutting her. "You know I'm right."

Simon lowered his head and sighed. "You are," he admitted, then turned back around and grabbed the next drink, paying the bartender again. He took a large swig of the drink, trying to distance himself from reality. That plan was ruined when River tapped him on the shoulder again. He turned around. "What?"

"Come home," she ordered, her tone cold and authoritative. "Rebelling won't get you anywhere."

"Hey now," the tremendous man next to him said as he turned to face them. "If a man wants a drink, he can get a drink. Why don't you run along now, get on home to mommy and daddy."

Her head turned to him with all the grace of an automated turret, and she frowned. "Stay out of this conversation. It's none of your concern."

"Like hell it ain't," he argued, and Simon shuddered as a giant meaty arm was draped over his shoulders. "Me an' Mr. Tuxedo here were havin' a mighty fine conversation."

"We were?" Simon asked, looking up at him.

"Uh... yeah. You told me why you was wearin' that get-up, somethin' about a luncheon meeting."

"Dinner party," he corrected, wondering why the man was suddenly so protective of him. The empty bottle of whiskey on the counter answered that question quickly enough.

"Right," the man agreed, removing his arm. "So go on now, git. Leave your husband alone."

Simon and River stared at him blankly.

"What?"

"This is my _sister_," Simon informed him. "I already told you I wasn't married."

The giant man blinked. "Oh. Uh... leave your brother alone," he corrected.

"The excess amount of alcohol in your system prevents you from realizing this man was released from the psychiatric ward at the planetary hospital ten hours ago," River babbled, and the man stared at her through bleary eyes.

"Huh?"

"You're drunk. He's crazy. I need to take him home."

"I ain't gonna say this again," he replied, stepping forward. It was then that Simon noticed the revolver strapped to his hip. He didn't reach for it, instead raising an arm and shoving River hard on her shoulder. "Get out."

River didn't stagger like Simon had expected she would after being pushed by roughly three hundred pounds of muscle. Instead she twisted her belly and moved her shoulder back to roll with the impact, then did something that he never expected.

Her left arm curved up, snatching the man's wrist and using it as leverage to pull herself forward and launch a quick chop at his throat. The man was completely unprepared for the sudden blow and reeled back, smashing against the counter. Simon jumped to the side reflexively to avoid being hit by the giant man, then watched as River marched forward, grabbed the glass Simon had been drinking out of, and smashed it across the side of her adversary's head.

He was dazed, but not unconscious yet. River took advantage of his stunned state and grabbed a bar stool, then drove it into the man's stomach. He doubled over, and she was already spinning around and bringing the improvised weapon to bear, shattering it over his back. He was sent to the floor, and Simon winced as he saw his head smack hard against the concrete. He was out cold.

Simon half expected for there to be a record scratch as the entire bar turned to look at them. But the music kept playing, trying in vain to keep the atmosphere intact.

Skills that hadn't been utilized in four years came rushing back to him, and Simon ran over to the man's unconscious form. His fingers went to check for a pulse on his neck, and he found that it was a little raised, but within acceptable parameters. He checked for lumps on the man's skull, and found a particularly nasty welt starting to develop on his forehead. There was just a little bit of blood seeping from the glass shards that had embedded themselves when River had smashed the beer glass over his head.

He would survive. Right now he had a bigger problem.

"River?" he said cautiously, standing up. "What did you just do?"

She stared at him and blinked for a few seconds. "Self-defense. Proper response to threatening gesture is to neutralize the threat. Estimated recovery time thirty minutes due to alcohol blocking pain receptors. We must be gone by then."

Simon was having enough trouble understanding her even without the alcohol that was just starting to kick in. He squinted at her. "What?"

"He pushed me," she explained in smaller words. "I knocked him unconscious. We need to get out of here before he wakes up."

He had already figured that out himself. "No, I mean _how_ did you do that?"

"No time. Explain later. Need to go."

Simon looked back at the bartender, who was glaring daggers at them. So was the rest of the bar.

"Yeah, I think that's a good idea," he agreed, stepping over the man's unconscious body. "Let's get out of here."

* * *

The ride home was spent in silence. River had evidently learned how to fly—and fly well—during her time at the Academy, as she handled the hover car better than any chauffer. She set it down gently on the landing pad, then ordered it to shut down. The machine complied, and she exited quickly.

"You're in trouble," she said matter-of-factly as they walked toward the house, and he didn't argue.

"I know," he said, catching up to her. He quietly wondered when exactly the roles had shifted between them. Normally he was the one keeping his sister out of trouble.

"You're still the older brother," she told him, looking straight ahead. "You just have a propensity to act irresponsibly when faced with the realization that nothing you do matters in the eyes of the ones who raised you."

"Huh?" he replied, still too impaired to comprehend what she was saying.

"You get drunk and act stupid to get attention," she translated. "Doesn't make you a bad person. Just makes you human."

"I still shouldn't have left you back at the party," he apologized. "I shouldn't have ruined it for you either."

"Your party," River said, shrugging. "You can cry if you want to."

He scoffed at that. "I did _not_ cry!"

"If you say so."

Simon rolled his eyes and followed her to the door. She opened it and they stepped inside. His parents were sitting in the living room, and his father stood up from the couch.

"Oh thank God," his mother breathed, then rushed over to hug him. "Simon, you had me so worried."

He didn't return the gesture.

"River, go to your room," Gabriel said. "We need to talk with Simon in private."

The girl—woman, he corrected himself—nodded and walked past him into the hallway. Simon's mother released him after a second and led him into the living room.

Simon was about to give his father a smart remark when a fist smashed hard across his face. He heard his mother gasp as he fell to the floor. "Gabriel!"

His father ignored her. "That's for acting like a _Bu lang bu you ben dan_!"

Simon rubbed his cheek where the fist had struck and stood up slowly. He said nothing.

"Do you have any idea what you did back there?" his father raged, anger swirling like a hurricane. "You did more than just embarrass us! You publicly shamed our family, and then you disappeared into another blackout zone! Not to mention what you've done for your future career chances!"

He continued to stay quiet. Simon didn't care enough to dignify his father with a response.

"You were locked up for _four years_!" Gabriel Tam shouted. "I thought you were sane when the doctors told me you were, but clearly one of those _chun zhu _psychiatrists is a complete _backbirth_ for thinking you're anything but a raving _lunatic_!"

"Your father's just worried about you," his mother cut in, trying to inject some calm into the situation. She wasn't very successful.

"Shut up, Gloria!" he yelled, and she shrunk back, taking a seat on the couch. He turned back to Simon.

"You can stay here for the night," he said, his red-hot tone from before having shifted to icy malice. "But first thing in the morning, you're going back there for another evaluation. I want to get a second opinion on just what the hell my son was thinking."

"Well, that didn't take long at all," Simon remarked. "Eleven hours after I've been released and you're already calling me crazy again."

"It's your own _gorram_ fault!" he yelled, all traces of civility having long been abandoned. The _real_ Gabriel Tam had come to the surface, and it was not a pleasant sight to behold. "You didn't have to sabotage yourself like you did! I was just trying to help and you burned _every_ bridge that was ever open to you!"

"Why did you send River to find me?" he asked suddenly, cutting through the fury with a single well-placed rebuttal. His father stood there stunned for a moment.

"What?"

"River was the one who found me and took me home," he repeated in slightly different terms. "My reputation died a long time ago, but she risked hers to get me out of that blackout zone. Why didn't you come and get me?"

Gabriel looked confused. "I... your mother and I didn't know where you were. We didn't even know River had gone to find you. One minute she was there and the next we were missing both our children."

"You weren't upset with her," Simon pointed out. "That means you knew where she was going, and you were okay with it. Why is that?"

He didn't seem to have an answer.

"She told us she knew where you were," his mother answered. "And that we had to trust her if we wanted her to bring you back. I'll admit, we were a bit hesitant, but your sister can be very persuasive."

"Well, that's a relief. I'm sure the fact that your own reputations have already been damaged enough didn't have anything to do with it at all."

"Simon," his father warned. "Show your mother some respect."

"Why?" he asked. "Why should I respect you when you've already said you're going to throw me back where I was? You're not my parents if the only thing you can do with me is lock me up in a cage where I can never embarrass you again. In fact, let's just skip the hospital entirely and throw me in the basement! I could be a horror story you tell people when they come over!"

Gabriel glared at him. "Go to your room, Simon. We'll decide what's going to happen to you in the morning."

Simon chuckled and walked past him. "That hasn't been my room in a long time," he replied, then stepped out into the hall. Red started creeping in at the corners of his vision, and Simon didn't remember making it to his room.

* * *

It was some time later when a pair of tiny hands shook him awake. He gasped and opened his eyes, and saw a slender form in the darkness.

"River?"

"Need to go," she whispered. "You're in danger."

"Huh?" He had a massive headache, most likely due to the alcohol he'd consumed the night before. "What's going on?"

"Already packed. Get up. Need to go before police arrive."

Simon sat up and shook his head. "River, what are you talking about?"

"Explain later," she said, gesturing for him to follow her. "Go now."

He stood up and followed her out of the room, belatedly noticing that he hadn't even changed before collapsing onto the bed. He didn't remember how he got there.

"Remind me never to drink again," he murmured as he rubbed his temple, trying to make the hangover go away. He tromped down the stairs after his sister, who was making no noise at all. He rounded the corner into the living room, then froze, the adrenaline hammering his hangover aside.

His parents were still in the living room. They weren't moving, likely due to the numerous stab wounds inflicted by a knife lying nearby. Simon didn't even need to check their vitals to realize that they were dead.

"What happened?" he heard himself ask somewhat distantly.

"Don't know," River told him, already by the door. "Need to leave."

Simon followed the command, tiptoeing past the corpses. He knew he was still in shock, and that the emotions associated with losing his parents would come later. For now, he was simply numb.

He glanced at the clock. Fourteen hours ago he had been in his cell, counting the seconds as they brought him closer to the moment of his death. Now it seemed closer than ever.

Following his sister out the door, Simon finally let himself realize that his life had just changed forever.

* * *

Author's Notes: Well, that was pretty strange, wasn't it? Let me know what you think.

I've been working on this story for a while now, and I'm getting a little tired of letting 30,000 words just sit on my hard drive unread, so I'll be releasing the first three parts of this "episode" that I have written. Who knows, maybe some feedback will convince me to write more.

In case you haven't guessed it by now, this story takes place in an alternate universe where Simon never got the chance to rescue his sister. I wanted to see what would happen if the Academy had "finished" River, and what effects that would have on Simon. Obviously, he went a little nuts. That's going to be very important later on. Of course, this doesn't mean that their roles have truly reversed. As River points out, Simon is just lashing out at his parents because they never take him seriously. He's still fiercely protective of his sister, and he can be charming when he wants to be. It's just that his parents bring out the worst in him. Hey, wouldn't _you_ be mad if you got locked up in a mental hospital for four years and your folks never came to visit you?

_Firefly_ is obviously not mine. But then again, Fox never did anything impressive with it, so I don't see why I can't play in their sandbox. It's way more interesting than just thinking about what could have been.


	2. No Questions Part II

Malcolm Reynolds was nervous.

He had been to the Core before, and the blackout zone allowed him to offload his cargo without having to run it through as many fancy Alliance checkpoints as he would have if he'd gone for one of the higher class districts. However, Allied Law Enforcement still held a significant presence in the area, and tended to be a lot more suspicious of anybody they caught trying to bypass the standard shipping lanes.

Not only that, but Jayne still hadn't gotten back from wherever he'd gone last night, and while Zoë was the one of the most capable people he knew, he would have preferred having some extra muscle right now. Especially if they got pinched and had to leave. He didn't like having to abandon members of his crew, even if they were as horrific as Jayne.

Still, he'd been in enough tense situations that he was able to hide his worry even better than he had hidden his cargo. Which was thankfully already off his ship, delivered to the mysterious clients whom he'd been smart enough not to ask questions about. That was not convincing the man in front of him, however.

"I already told you, Agent..."

"Dobson," the nebbish Alliance agent in front of him replied for the fifth time.

"Right, Dobson. If I had any illegal cargo on my boat, I think I'd know about it."

"And you'd also be smart enough to lie," he deadpanned, looking down at the light paper on his clipboard as symbols danced across it. "Says here you lifted off from Persephone three weeks ago, right after Federal Agents tried to board your vessel."

"I was in a hurry," he replied, trying to make it sound innocuous.

Dobson nodded as if he planned to use that statement in court. "And why is that?"

"Why is what?"

"Why were you in a hurry?" He seemed to recognize that Mal was stalling, but played along nonetheless.

"Well... uh..."

Dobson sighed. "Captain Reynolds, I really don't have time for this. I know who you are."

"Oh really?"

"Yes," he replied, flipping to another piece of light paper. "You fought in the Unification War on the side of the Independents. You were born on one of the border planets and you spent most of your life on the rim. I can't really imagine a reason why you'd come this far into the Core unless you were smuggling something."

"Lots of reasons to come to the Core," Mal insisted. "Got some really spiffy buildings to look at." He mimed looking around at the skyscrapers, and admitted to himself that they _were_ awful pretty.

"I doubt you've parked your ship in a blackout zone just to take the local tour," Dobson challenged. "And you still haven't told me why you were in such a hurry to leave Persephone."

He sighed and put his hands up. "Okay, you got me." He reached into his coat, and the soldiers behind Dobson raised their weapons. Dobson put up a hand to stop them and waited for Mal to retrieve the item from his coat. When he saw it, his expression went from annoyed to utterly baffled. "People just _really_ love these bobbly-headed Geisha dolls. Couldn't keep 'em waiting."

Dobson blinked, glanced at his chart, then looked back up to Mal. "Do you think I'm a complete idiot, Captain Reynolds?"

"Possibly."

He scowled. "That does it." He gestured to the soldiers behind him. "I want a full search of this vessel. Top and bottom. Look in the bulkheads, that's where everything gets hidden."

"That won't be necessary," a voice behind Mal said, and he thanked shiny Buddha that his guardian angel had arrived just in time.

"I beg your pardon?" Dobson asked.

"You wanted to know why the Captain was in such a hurry when he lifted off from Persephone," Inara explained as she stepped in front of Mal. "He was doing it on my account. I had a _very_ important client to meet here and a very small time window to meet him in. I regret that those agents weren't able to fulfill their jobs, but they wouldn't have found anything if they came on board."

Dobson checked his clipboard. "Inara Serra. Says here you rent the shuttle on _Serenity_."

"That's true," she replied. "The Captain and I have a business arrangement. He helps me get to clients, and I help him out with matters that require a little more respectability."

"Mm-hm. Speaking of respectability, you are aware that it's considered illegal for a person of your stature to be in a blackout zone?"

Mal raised an eyebrow at that. "Who made that law, the fashion police?" Everybody turned to stare at him.

"No," answered Dobson, the concept of humor apparently lost on him. "Due to the type of people these areas attract—smugglers, for example—it's assumed that the only reason someone with high social standing would venture here is if they were looking to be involved in... less respectable activities."

He chuckled. "Oh, but scoundrels like me, it's perfectly fine if we're here, right? I mean, I understand. Gotta keep everybody with their own kind."

Dobson appeared flustered. "That is _not_ what I—"

"I'm not responsible for where he docks his ship," Inara pointed out. "And I must say, I'm insulted you would insinuate that I'd have anything to do with criminals."

"So Captain Reynolds and his crew _are_ criminals?"

"I never said that," she snapped. "Go ahead and search the ship. You won't find anything."

Dobson paused and looked at his clipboard for a few seconds, then put a finger to his ear. He listened intently for several seconds, then looked back to them. "That won't be necessary," he said finally. "I'll take the word of a Guild Companion. But if you're lying about this, you're just as culpable."

"I understand," she replied gracefully.

He turned away and muttered something under his breath, and four armed soldiers followed him.

"Well," Mal breathed, lowering his hands. "That went surprisingly well."

"Don't be stupid," Inara scolded as she watched them go. "He just got called off for something more important. They'll probably be back later."

He nodded. "I figured as much. I aim to be gone by then." He turned around to address his first mate. "Zoë, have you heard from Jayne yet?"

Zoë shook her head. "He's been gone too long. Something must've happened."

"Well, go find him. Try an' be discreet about it."

"Yes sir," she replied, then nodded over his shoulder. "Found him."

Mal turned around to see his hired muscle lumbering toward the ship, looking suspiciously like he'd been involved in a bar brawl the night before. He had a series of small cuts on his right temple, and there was a massive welt in the middle of his forehead. The look on his face suggested he wasn't pleased by the results of the battle.

"There you are, Jayne," he greeted as the large man got closer. "Looks like you got in some trouble last night."

He quietly wondered why Jayne suddenly looked nervous, like his most embarrassing secret had just been revealed to the entire universe. "Uh... yeah, Cap'n. Got into a big scuffle last night. Half the bar wanted a piece of ol' Jayne."

"Half the bar, is that right?" He got the feeling that the giant man was lying to cover his bruised ego. He decided to let him.

"Yup. You think I look bad, you should see the other guys."

"Let's get you into the Infirmary," Inara said slowly, coming around and reaching for his arm. "It looks like some of those cuts on your head are still bleeding."

He glared at her. "I'll be fine," he insisted. "Taken a lot worse in my time. Hell, half o' those suckers couldn't even put up a decent fight."

"You should get inside anyway," Mal told him. "Just barely managed to dodge the Feds, think they might be comin' back. We need to take off before they get here."

Jayne nodded. "Aye, Cap'n," he answered as he lumbered inside. Inara followed him, trying to get a closer look at the wounds. He wasn't letting her.

"You get inside too, Zoë," he ordered. "Tell Wash to take us out of the world. An' make sure the preacher's still on board. Last thing I want is to have to come back 'cause he was too busy converting lost souls."

"I saw him earlier," she replied. "He got back last night, same as Inara."

He nodded. "Good." She disappeared inside, and he was preparing to follow her when he heard the high pitched whine of an anti-gravity engine behind them.

"What the hell?" he muttered under his breath, worried for a moment that the Feds had already come back. He instead saw a hover car, civilian model, carrying one driver and one passenger that he could see. It landed less than two meters away, and the driver exited and started approaching him. She looked young, no older than early twenties, dressed like she belonged anywhere but here. Her hair was long and brown, and her face was halfway obscured by a pair of dark sunglasses. Mal decided to find out what she wanted.

"Hello," she greeted cheerfully.

"Uh… hi."

Her broad smile was strangely hypnotizing. "We require transport off-world. Wherever you're heading is fine."

Mal raised an eyebrow. "Not lookin' to take on passengers, little lady."

She did not seem at all deterred. "We can pay you. I'm certain you can spare a little room."

"Well, I do have a couple empty rooms in the passenger dorms, but I'm not so sure..." He trailed off when she handed him the largest stack of credits he had ever seen. "_Wo bu shin wo dah yan jing_, that's a lotta cash."

"Ten thousand," she confirmed, and his eyes became saucers. "More than you make from your normal jobs, I'm sure."

"How do you know what I...?" He trailed off, wondering why anybody would pay that much money just for a ride. "What're you runnin' from?"

"Nothing," she insisted. "We're just in a big hurry."

He doubted she was telling the truth, but he wasn't one to turn down easy money. "Ain't we all." He pocketed the credits. "Welcome aboard."

She grinned. "Excellent. Now step aside."

"What?"

The girl walked back to her hover car, and it took Mal until she was in the driver's seat and heading straight for him to figure it out.

"_Ta ma de_!" he shouted, rolling to the side as the hover car shot past him into the bay.

"Okay, just set it down right in the middle of my cargo bay," he mumbled as she did just that. "That's fine." He was being sarcastic, but the ten thousand credits in his pocket told him that she could set that hover car wherever she damn well pleased.

He stood up and pressed a button on the controls, and the outer ramp started to close, followed by the airlock doors. He slapped the intercom. "Wash, you ready to take off?"

"_Just a second, Captain._" He heard the thrusters firing up outside. "_Okay, we're shiny. Hang on to something._"

Mal knew that the inertial compensators made that statement unnecessary. He nodded to himself and then started walking toward the mysterious passengers who had paid him ten thousand credits for a lift.

* * *

Being a Federal Investigator meant that one handled a variety of crimes. It wasn't quite the same as being a Marshal, though both had interplanetary jurisdiction and went through extensive combat training just like every member of Allied Law Enforcement. The power they wielded meant that they usually went after the biggest crimes; the ones ordinary police and security detachments were unable to handle. An ordinary double homicide would not normally have qualified, and in fact she'd had to request the case specifically.

Alecia had known the Tams her entire life, enough so that she considered them part of her own family. She understood that it was a bad idea to investigate people she knew, but that didn't matter to her. Something was definitely wrong here.

She watched her team go over the crime scene while she waited for her partner, whom she'd sent to investigate the Firefly in her stead. They had located it just that morning and she was planning on going there herself, but then she had received news that Gabriel and Gloria Tam had been brutally murdered, and their children were nowhere to be found.

Homicides were nothing new to her. She had stood in the middle of a dozen mutilated bodies without losing her lunch. In all her years of solving mysteries, there were only three times that she'd had trouble keeping her composure. One was her second week on the job, a quintuple homicide and her first murder investigation. The second was the only time she'd ever actually vomited at a crime scene, when the culprits had pulled the Reaver excuse. Alecia didn't believe in Reavers, but that experience had taught her that some people were just monsters. What she had seen back then still kept her up some nights.

The third time she'd had to force herself to remain calm and detached was today, but not because she was feeling sick. It was because deep inside, in a place where no one would ever see, Alecia wanted to cry.

"_Wo de ma_," she heard Dobson say behind her, and she turned around.

"That's what I said," she agreed, and stepped over to him.

"What happened?" he asked weakly.

"Multiple stab wounds," she answered, injecting confidence into her voice to make up for her partner's relative lack of experience with crime scenes. Dobson was a Marshal, not an Investigator. "Looks like whoever did it made sure they died fast. Jugular veins were severed on both of them, and we still haven't been able to find a usable print on the knife."

"I see," Dobson replied, and she could tell that he was trying to steel himself. She could sympathize. "Do we have any suspects?"

Alecia shook her head. "Security system is state-of-the-art. Laser fence, motion detectors, everything except cameras. Unfortunately, none of it was turned on when the murder happened."

"Meaning we have no leads."

"Not exactly. The knife matches the set in the kitchen, which means that the intruder didn't bring any weapons of their own. And like I already said, the way they killed them shows that they knew what they were doing. That means we're dealing with a professional, someone who knows a lot about the human body, or at least how to kill one."

"But no name."

She understood his frustration. No suspects meant that he was useless in this part of the investigation. She couldn't figure out anything else either, so she decided to find out what he knew.

"What were you able to learn about the Firefly?"

The uncertainty left his face immediately and Dobson fished out his data pad. "It's definitely the transport we were looking for. It's called _Serenity_, captained by Malcolm Reynolds. I wasn't able to get the names of the rest of the crew, except for the Companion who rents one of the shuttles, Inara Serra."

Alecia recognized that name. "I met her at the dinner party last night," she revealed. "She was there with Dr. White."

"You were at a party?" Dobson asked, and she resisted the urge to kick herself.

"Special invite," she explained. "Actually, that party may be worth looking at." She gestured to the murder victims. "These two were the ones who invited me."

"Interesting," he said, and made a note of that on his data pad. "What was the party for?"

"Their son, Simon. He'd just gotten released from the psychiatric ward of the hospital where he used to work."

Dobson frowned. "Psychiatric ward?"

"He was diagnosed as insane after he spent three years trying to get his sister to come back from some Academy," she told him. "The doctors gave him full release yesterday and the Tams threw a party to celebrate it. Only he didn't exactly appreciate it, and he left before dinner even started." She smiled. "At least I got a good dance out of him."

He stared blankly. "You know him?"

"Childhood friend," she explained. And once upon a time, they'd been more than just friends. Not that he needed to know that. "I've known the Tams my entire life."

"I see. Is that why you requested this case?"

She nodded. The two of them had worked together for long enough that Dobson could understand her reasons for doing this.

"You said he left the party early?"

"Yes."

He wrote something down on his data pad. "That means he has an alibi."

Alecia felt something flare up within her, and she had to fight it down before she spoke. "Did you think Simon killed them?"

"Until you said he was somewhere else, yes," he answered. "The man was released from the psychiatric ward just yesterday."

"Because he was perfectly sane," she snapped in a tone that brooked no disagreement. "Otherwise he'd still be there."

Dobson didn't push it any further. "You mentioned he had a sister?"

She nodded. "River. She was off at that Academy for seven years and just came back a couple days ago. I went to her dinner too."

"And they're both missing."

"Yes. So is the family hover car. We searched all the rooms, and there are a number of clothes missing, as well as some other personal effects." She'd been to this house often enough to know what belonged in each room. "That leads me to believe that they left after seeing what happened to their parents. What I don't get is why."

"Something scared them, maybe?"

"Perhaps. But the bodies were discovered by house-cleaning. They had to be running from something if they didn't call the police."

Dobson frowned, and so did she. The trail of logic ended there. She couldn't figure out a valid reason for the two of them just disappearing like that. She sighed.

"We'll let the team finish up here," she decided. "Let's go interrogate the crew of that Firefly."

Her partner stared at her blankly.

"You _did_ detain them, right?"

Dobson looked away. "Well... I got your message right when I was in the middle of questioning them. It sounded urgent."

"It was," she admitted. "But they were our only lead on that case. Tell me you at least put a land lock on their ship."

"They were in a blackout zone," he answered sheepishly. "No connection to the Cortex means the ship couldn't be land locked."

"_Bie wu long_!" she cursed, and Dobson shrunk back. "You confronted them with four armed soldiers, accused them of smuggling stolen goods from Persephone, and then just _walked away_ without even land locking their ship? What would you do if you were in their shoes?"

He didn't answer.

"They've probably taken off already!" she shouted, then started running for the door. It took him a few moments to follow her, and she mumbled a few more choice words under her breath as she sprinted for her transport. If he wasn't right behind her when she took off, she wasn't waiting for him.

* * *

"So... uh... start with the names," Mal said to his two mysterious passengers as they unloaded the hover car. The other passenger was male, slightly older than the girl but still young. He wore an expensive suit, and looked vaguely uncomfortable being here. Mal guessed that this voyage had not been his idea.

"I'm Simon," he answered politely. "This is my sister, River."

"That's an unusual name," he commented. River was bent over the side of the hover car, retrieving luggage from the back seat. She hefted it and turned around.

"So is Mal," she shot back, and he blinked.

"I never told you _my_ name," Mal replied cautiously. River shrugged and went back to unloading the hover car.

"She looked you up," Simon revealed. "Wanted to know who we were flying with before we gave them any money."

That made sense. Mal himself would sure as hell be careful where he spent ten thousand credits. That still didn't answer how she knew his nickname. No Cortex search in the 'verse would have told them that.

Of course, there _were _other ways of finding it out. Ways that people who spent ten thousand credits for passage on a ship would probably be able to afford.

"What else do you know about me?"

River looked at him again, and something happened to her eyes. She looked as though she wasn't entirely there. After a few moments, she answered him.

"Your full name is Malcolm Reynolds. You were born on Shadow, spent most of your life on a ranch until you were old enough to fight in the Unification War, where you became a Sergeant. After the war you bought this ship and put together a crew. Named it _Serenity_, after your greatest failure. Now you fly all over the galaxy taking whatever jobs you can get. You'd like to steer clear of the Core, but sometimes you need the money and—"

"Okay, stop." He held up a hand. "That is _way_ too personal. How much did you pay for that information?"

She blinked at him. "Pay?"

"Yeah, pay. There's people out there who compile data on other people, then sell it for the right price. I'm thinkin' since you had ten thousand credits to pay me with, you must've spent a lotta money to get that much info on me." He didn't tell her just how much it creeped him out that she knew all that. Especially why he named the ship. Nobody else knew that except Zoë, and she was the most loyal person he knew. She wouldn't sell him out.

"Didn't pay," she insisted. "Figured it out myself."

Now that was definitely curious.

"River's kind of a genius," Simon explained. "There's nothing she can't do if she puts her mind to it."

Mal got the feeling that was more than just a brotherly boast. She certainly seemed smarter than he'd first thought. "Okay, next question: why are y'all on my boat? What are you runnin' from?"

River whirled to face him. "Ten thousand means you don't get to ask questions," she said sharply.

He was tempted to tell her that he could just throw her out the airlock and keep the money, but that was needlessly cruel and he was only mad because _nobody_ told him what to do on _his_ ship. Still, he'd agreed to no questions for a lot less in the past. As long as they stayed out of his way, it really didn't matter.

"Okay, fair enough. Where y'all headed?"

"Wherever you are," she replied. "Need to get away from the Core. Away from Alliance. Knew you would be the smartest choice for that."

Mal smirked. "I think you and I are gonna get along just fine," he decided. "We'll be touchin' down on Persephone in a couple days. Meantime, let me show you where you'll be stayin'."

* * *

"Ow!" Jayne yelled, jerking his head to the side. "Watch what you're pickin' at, woman!"

"You still have glass embedded in your skin," Inara replied in a stern tone, maneuvering a pair of tweezers around his right temple. "It needs to come out or you could get an infection."

"Hell, that ain't gonna happen," he insisted. "The cup had alcohol in it. Ah!"

She carefully pulled out the glass shard and set it down in a metal tray. "That's not how it works. You've got a bit of dirt in your wounds too, and they're still not healed. You really shouldn't get into so many bar fights."

"Hey, I can't help it if people want a piece o' me. 'Sides, you've seen me in worse shape than this. Ow!" He slapped her hand away. "Gorramit, 'Nara, do it _right_!"

"I could get Zoë to do it if you'd prefer to keep screaming like a toddler," she rebutted, and he grit his teeth.

"Rather no one do it," he grumbled, but stayed seated in the Infirmary chair.

Inara laughed. "And what would you do? Hope that whoever tries punching you in the face gets a fistful of glass instead?" He scowled. "Zoë and I are the only ones with any sort of medical training," she continued, tugging on another shard. "If you keep these in here, they could get under your skin, and then you'd _really_ be in trouble."

"Why's that? Ow!"

She set the shard down in the tray. "Because they could burrow straight into your brain," she teased.

His eyes got wide. "Serious?"

"Well, I'm not a doctor, so I couldn't say for certain. It's just something I heard. You probably wouldn't have to worry about it anyway."

Jayne raised an eyebrow. "Why not?"

"Nothing for it to burrow down to."

An ugly sneer took over his face. "_Ha ha_. Agh! Can't you dope me or somethin'?"

"Aren't you supposed to be a big bad mercenary?" she challenged. "I've seen you take _bullets_ and not complain this much."

"That's 'cause _somebody_ usually _doped_ me," he snarled. "Ain't no sense in havin' to endure pain when you don't have to. Ow! See? I wouldn't even know you just screwed up!"

"Anesthetic costs a lot of money," Inara countered, dabbing a sheet of gauze where she had accidentally torn one of the wounds further open. "So unless you'd like it to come out of your cut, I suggest you be still and let me work."

Jayne huffed and crossed his arms. "You sound like my Ma."

She chuckled at that. "Well, we are kind of a family on this ship. You've been with us for how long, Jayne?"

"Longer'n you," he answered, then jerked to the side as she pulled on another shard. "_Tai kong suo you de xing qiu sai jin wo de pi gu_!" he ranted, rocketing to his feet. "That's it! No more first aid for you!"

Inara stepped back, part of her surprised at how much his vocabulary had grown, and the other part disgusted that he was using said vocabulary to compare the pain he was feeling to all the planets in the universe being shoved up his butt. Then again, that was Jayne. Once he started speaking a language, there was no limit to how much he could pervert it.

"I'll be in the Mess," he grumbled, then stormed out of the Infirmary. Inara rolled her eyes and started cleaning up.

"And that concludes the tour of the cargo bay," she heard Mal saying, and peeked through the Infirmary windows to see him descending the stairs into the common area. "Over there is our Infirmary. That's where folks go to get patched up after they've been hurt."

"I know what an Infirmary is, Captain," she heard a familiar voice say, and gasped. She walked out of the Infirmary to see for herself.

"Do you now?" Mal was asking, turning around to face him. That meant he didn't notice Inara as she stepped behind him. "And why is that?"

"Probably because he's a Doctor," she answered for him. Mal turned around, and the Doctor's eyes did a passable impression of dinner plates. "Hello, Dr. Tam."

"Inara," he breathed, looking slightly confused.

Mal appeared just as perplexed. He motioned between them. "You two know each other?"

"You remember that party I went to last night?" He shook his head. "Don't lie." He rolled his eyes. "Simon here was the guest of honor."

"Really now?" He grinned and turned around, crossing his arms. "And what cause was there to celebrate?"

"No questions," the girl named River snapped. Mal obeyed, making it Inara's turn to be confused. She decided to ignore it for now.

"If I knew you were here I'd have had _you_ pick the glass out of Jayne's head," she told Simon, who raised an eyebrow.

"Did one of your crew get hurt?" he asked Mal.

"No worse than usual," he answered in a tone that suggested he wondered why the Doctor was asking. "Got into a minor scuffle last night, should be fine in a little while."

"I see."

"So what _are_ you doing here?" she asked Simon. "I thought you'd be happy to spend a little time at home."

He looked away, and she could see he wasn't trying to hide the sadness on his face. "I don't have a home," he said quietly.

"Wouldn't have figured you for the homeless type," said Mal, seemingly oblivious to the deeper meaning behind that statement. "'Specially not since you paid me so much just to get a ride to Persephone."

Inara raised an eyebrow. "They're passengers?"

"Sure," the Captain answered, turning around. "What else would they be?"

She smiled. "I thought you didn't take passengers on Core worlds."

"I do when they pay me ten thousand credits up front."

Her eyes widened at the number, and his grin told her exactly how he planned to spend that money. "Ten thousand?" she repeated. "Why would anybody pay that much?"

"Big hurry," River explained, though Inara sensed that wasn't the real reason. At least now she understood why Mal was practically laying out the red carpet for them, even if he was interrogating them at the same time.

"I see."

"Well Inara, are you here to join the tour or did you need something?" Mal asked in what passed for polite by his standards. She smiled gracefully.

"I'll be heading back to my shuttle in a moment," she answered. "I just wanted to say hello to our new guests." She started walking past them into the cargo bay.

"Okay then," she heard Mal say. "Now, over there are the rooms where you'll be stayin'. I do have to ask you to..." The rest of his sentence was lost to the rumble of the atmosphere processors as she stepped into the cargo bay and started heading up to her shuttle.

Inara gripped the railing and flowed up the stairs, her graceful steps hidden by her elegant dress. She let her thoughts wander as she climbed. Simon seemed different from the way he'd been acting last night. At the party he'd reminded her of Mal, which had immediately caught her interest. He had acted brash and impulsive, speaking his mind without giving a damn what the rest of the people present thought of him. When she confronted him outside, he had reverted back to a lost child, sad and angry but unwilling to drag her into the pain he was experiencing. That also reminded her of Mal.

She was at the door to her shuttle before she realized it, and she pulled open the handle and stepped inside. The smell of incense greeted her, and she let it put her mind at rest. The way the Doctor had acted in the common area was also similar to Mal, but notably different as well. Malcolm Reynolds was a proud man, spending his whole life behind a mask that hardly ever cracked to show the broken person underneath. It had been hardened by years of war and border living, and she rarely got to glimpse beyond it. Of course, her own mask had been refined by her Companion training, and she almost never let it slip either.

Simon's mask was still developing. It was clear that he had some things he was hiding, but it was like watching a boy stand with his arms outstretched in front of an open closet where all his darkest secrets were kept. It would require little effort to push past him and see what lay in the darkness beyond, if she felt the inclination to do so. For the moment, Inara respected his privacy just as he seemed to respect hers. That was yet another thing that made her think of her relationship with Mal.

That thought gave Inara pause as she sat down on the luxurious red couch that helped make her shuttle feel less like a transport and more like a home. When had she started to consider what they had a relationship? She'd certainly used the word to describe it before, but it was always preceded by "business," and the second word was usually "arrangement" instead. She smiled and shook her head. Perhaps she was thinking too deeply into things because Simon represented a vision of what Mal might have been like before the war destroyed his faith in everything except the people on his crew. She admitted to herself that such a thing would be fascinating to see.

His sister was a curiosity as well. She had been formally introduced to River at the party, but Inara still felt as though she hadn't actually met the girl. Her body language was practically indecipherable, no matter where she happened to be. At the party she had been a contradiction, hesitant and withdrawn around people but still engaged in the celebration itself, and her attention seemed just as fluid as her namesake. Just a few minutes ago she had been cold and mechanical, hidden behind an iron mask that refused all attempts to peer beyond it. Inara thought Mal was complicated, but River was an utter mystery.

Now the two of them were passengers on _Serenity_, and Inara suspected that it wasn't just random chance that had brought them together again. Something bigger was definitely at work here, though she had absolutely no idea what. She knew what the Shepherd would say, though.

Simon and River had to be running from something; that much was certain. What it was she didn't know, but after a moment she decided it didn't matter. This wasn't her ship. Malcolm Reynolds decided where _Serenity _traveled in The Black, and like the new passengers, Inara was simply along for the ride.

* * *

"Okay then," Mal said as soon as Inara left. "Now, over there are the rooms where you'll be stayin'. I do have to ask you to stay in this area while we're en route. Not carryin' any cargo at the moment, but I'd prefer it if you stayed clear of all the crew areas."

"Why is that?" Simon asked.

"No questions cuts both ways," he answered, suddenly serious. "You two are among the most mysterious people I've had on my boat, and no offense, but it takes more than ten thousand credits to get me to trust somebody I don't know. So unless you'd like to fill me in on what it is y'all are runnin' from, and maybe a little background information too, I don't want you crawlin' around unless I have some idea where you are."

He ignored the cold glare River sent his way, though he admitted that it was awful scary seeing someone her size look so threatening. If Mal hadn't been so good at death glares himself, he might have been intimidated.

"We understand," Simon said after a moment. "But since you already showed us the cargo bay, I assume that's not off-limits?"

"Nothin' in there that you could hurt," he replied. "Just stay away from the airlock doors and everything'll be shiny."

"Got it." He looked around. "I don't suppose ten thousand credits would get us a warm meal or two?"

Mal laughed. "Hell, for that much I'll let you have real food instead of protein supplements. Dinner's not for another few hours, but let me show you the Mess anyway." He led them up a staircase and through a hall until they arrived at the doorway to the Mess.

He pointed to the left, where ominous looking machinery lay at the end of a long hall. "That there's the engine room," he informed them. "That falls under the crew-only areas I mentioned earlier, so don't take no field trips. 'Sides, if Kaylee caught you in there she'd probably cut your head off with an arc welder." He chuckled at his own joke, but it seemed lost on his two guests.

"Kaylee?" Simon repeated, a look of confusion on his face. "You have a female mechanic?"

"Yeah," he replied. "Why? Somethin' weird about that?"

The young Doctor backpedaled quickly, and Mal hid his smirk. He _did_ think it was odd. "No, I just... never mind."

"Okay." He turned around and walked into the Mess, and spotted something that made him slap his forehead. "Jayne! We eat at the table!"

Jayne was currently in the process of draining a sack of protein juice by holding it over his head as he stood in the middle of the kitchen. He finished it and turned around with a cocky smirk on his face, which quickly changed to abject horror when he saw the two new passengers. For a few extremely awkward moments, he simply stared.

"Okay," he said in a slow, measured tone. "I'm gonna close my eyes. When I open 'em in five seconds, y'all better not be there." He did as promised, and Mal exchanged curious glances with Simon and River. He opened his eyes again and his face twisted up into a scowl. "Gorramit."

"Jayne, what the hell is wrong with you today?" Mal questioned, crossing his arms. "First you come to me lookin' like hell, and now you're tryin' to see if my new passengers are all part of some twisted dream? I think maybe you oughta lie down."

"Uh... yeah, Cap'n. I think that's a great idea." He stared nervously at the people behind him, and Mal noticed that his eyes were not watching Simon.

He was looking at River.

The pieces came together in a single brilliant moment, and Mal had to stop himself from howling with laughter. "Jayne," he said after a moment, barely keeping his laughter in check. "Did you get beat up by a little girl?"

Jayne's eyes shot open and he dropped the empty protein pack on the floor. "I'm tellin' you Mal, that girl ain't little!" he replied, pointing accusingly at the mysterious ninety pound passenger. "She's a machine from the future or somethin'!"

"River is not a machine," Simon protested. "And is there _anyone_ on this crew that I haven't already met?"

"I don't recognize you," Zoë said from the other end of the Mess. Wash was beside her, and Mal guessed that Jayne's outburst had drawn them away from the bridge. She looked at him. "Who are they?"

"Simon Tam," the Doctor introduced himself. "This is my sister, River. We're passengers heading to Persephone."

"And what exactly is Jayne hollering about this time?" she asked, her voice completely deadpan.

"She kicked his ass," Mal answered bluntly, pointing over his shoulder at River. "I knew he couldn't handle half the bar and still be in one piece."

Zoë reacted with her usual stoicism, while Wash doubled over, laughing hysterically to the point where he couldn't form complete sentences. "You... she... half the bar...? Bwa ha ha ha!"

"Hey, _shut up_!" Jayne yelled, trying desperately to reassert his masculinity now that his dignity had been compromised. "Way she was movin', girl probably _coulda_ handled half the bar by herself. I still say she's a robot."

"Yes, it couldn't have been the fact that you were drunk and she took you by surprise," Simon replied dryly. "I'm sure that underneath that thin layer of skin there's a cold mechanical mind just waiting to kill us all." The statement drew giggles from around the room.

He scowled. "Yeah, laugh if you want to. None'a y'all saw it, so you don't know what happened."

"I saw it," the Doctor reminded him.

"I was talkin' to them." He gestured around the room.

"So wait, Jayne," Wash said now that his giggle fit was over. "Exactly _how_ drunk were you that a _ninety pound girl_ was able to steamroll you?" He went back to cackling.

"She didn't steamroll me!" he protested, then pointed to his right temple. "She smashed me over the head with a glass an' then knocked me out with a bar stool. Gorram little ninja girl wasn't fightin' fair."

"If I recall correctly, them's standard bar-fightin' implements," Mal countered. "You've used 'em more than once."

"Yeah, well, you shoulda seen the first thing she did. Hit me in the throat with a gorram Judo chop."

"Judo doesn't have chops," Zoë informed him. "It's all throws and grapples."

"Whatever, don't change the fact that the girl knew martial arts. I was too busy tryin' to breathe to fight back."

"And you were drunk," Wash added.

"Right."

"If we're _finished_," Mal said in his Captain Voice, causing the rest of the crew to pay attention, "maybe you can get yourself back down to the Infirmary an' let the Doctor take a look at that glass in your head. Don't want it burrowin' down to your brainpan."

Jayne scowled in confusion. "Doctor?"

"Well, I _was_ a Trauma Surgeon once upon a time," Simon replied. "But that was years ago. I'm kind of out of practice."

"You still remember how to treat wounds, don't you?" asked Mal, to which he shrugged.

"First Aid is hard to forget," he admitted. "And I did manage to pass the time by reading medical journals while I was locked away, but—"

"Locked away?" Zoë interjected, and Mal noticed that the Doctor looked just as nervous as Jayne had been. He hadn't wanted to reveal that.

"Not something I want to talk about," he said firmly. "It shouldn't have any bearing on how I interact with this crew."

"Be that as it may, I'm still kind of curious..." Mal began, but trailed off when he saw River glare at him.

"No. Questions," she snapped, and he surrendered. He was a bit more afraid of her now that he knew what she'd done to Jayne. That still didn't mean he was intimidated, but caution wouldn't be a bad idea when dealing with her.

"Alright. Doc, you capable enough to patch Jayne up, or do I have to give the job to Zoë?"

Simon crossed his arms. "I'm kind of curious why you're asking me to do this in the first place. Last I checked I wasn't on your crew, and we paid you ten thousand credits so I know you don't need me to pull my weight. And I'm getting the sneaking suspicion that your hulking man-ape over there doesn't exactly trust me."

"He's right," Jayne confirmed. "I ain't lettin' him poke around my head if he ain't even done any doctorin' in the last few years."

"Jayne, shut up. Doc, reason I'm askin' you to do this has nothin' to do with whether you're on my crew or not. If you're on my boat _at all_, I need to be able to trust you. One way you can earn that trust is to fix up Jayne. Otherwise, I'm gonna ask you to tell me your whole life story in front of everyone, ten thousand credits or not." He crossed his arms and gave him his second best Captain's Glare.

Simon glared right back, but relented after a moment. "Fine." He looked at Jayne. "Shall we?"

The huge mercenary sneered at him, but followed the Doctor out of the room regardless. Wash and Zoë wandered back to the bridge, but River stayed behind for some reason.

"This extortion will cost you five hundred of the ten thousand we gave you," she said menacingly, and Mal raised an eyebrow at her.

"Extortion?" he repeated, chuckling. "This ain't extortion. Extortion would be makin' you tell me why you're here anyway. As it is, I'm perfectly happy to let you have your privacy so long as you do me the occasional favor. Can't trust you if I don't know who you are."

"I know who you are," she reminded him.

"And that is yet another reason I'm not entirely sure about trusting you," he told her. "You won't tell me how you got that info, so I can't assume anything positive about you."

She made a very childlike face. "Trusted you enough to give you ten thousand credits."

"And ain't nobody spends money like that on a vessel like this unless they're either lookin' to buy the ship or they're runnin' from something and they don't want anyone to know. And given your no questions policy, I'm suspectin' there's something you're hiding. So unless you wanna tell me what it is, you'll agree to my terms, _dong ma_?"

River scowled at him. "Fine. Captain Tightpants." She turned around and left, leaving Mal with more questions than answers.

"When the hell did my life get so interesting?" he wondered aloud, then headed for the bridge.

* * *

"Ow!" Jayne hollered, wondering how in the universe he had gotten himself into this situation again. "Careful, Doc!"

"You know, it would help if you didn't move around so much." He moved the tweezers around to find another piece of glass. "I might be able to avoid hurting you."

Jayne grumbled and crossed his arms over his chest, trying to block out the pain. "Hey, let me ask you somethin'."

"What is it?"

"Is it true that glass'll bore through your skull if you leave it in there?"

The Doctor looked confused for a moment, then answered. "No. Why? Who told you that?"

"Uh, nobody. Just wonderin'."

"Well, it's still dangerous to leave it in there," he said, retrieving another shard. Jayne had lost count of how many the Doc had pulled out of his head. He worked faster and less painfully than Inara, that was for sure, but he wasn't about to let him know that. "Glass can keep your wounds open for longer than normal, which can lead to infection. I'll need to swab your head with alcohol when I'm finished here."

Jayne scowled. "Hell, I already got enough alcohol on my face last night."

"Yes, but I'll still need to do it regardless. Beer contains hops and more than a little bit of barley, which is a type of grain. If you let that sit for too long, it can be very dangerous, not to mention embarrassing."

The mercenary had stopped listening after 'barley.' "Meanin' what?"

The Doc looked at him seriously. "You could get a yeast infection on your head."

His eyes shot open, and Jayne turned to the Doctor with an incredulous expression on his face. "Now I know you're jerkin' with me. Ain't no way that could happen."

"Actually, it's quite common," he replied, and Jayne tried to read his body language to see if he was lying, but couldn't tell. Inara had always been the master at that. "I saw it more than a few times when I was working the ER."

"An' how ruttin' long ago was _that_?" The Doc sounded like he knew what he was talking about, but Jayne wasn't the trusting sort.

"Four years," he replied, and as far as the mercenary could tell, he was being honest. "Some of my knowledge is a bit out of date, but that's mostly extremely advanced procedures that you don't normally see. Not to mention I was smart enough to graduate in the top three percent of my class and finish my Internship in eight months."

Jayne raised an eyebrow. "That s'pposed to mean somethin'?"

"Internships usually take the better part of a year to complete," he explained. "I was enough of a genius that I moved through the rotation faster than almost everybody else. 'Gifted' was the term."

"More like freakish," Jayne rebutted.

"You don't strike me as someone who got a lot of education," he said, which got the mercenary's blood to boil. He grit his teeth, but stopped when pain lanced through his skull.

"Yeah, an' you don't strike me as someone who's _smart_," he countered. "Otherwise you probably wouldn't be in whatever situation you're in right now. Hell, even I know ya don't pay ten thousand credits 'less you're runnin' from somethin'."

"My personal life is none of your business," the Doctor replied, removing another piece of glass.

"Seemed interested in sharin' last night," Jayne reminded him, then wondered if he could have phrased that in a way that didn't imply something scandalous. "Uh... at the bar that is."

Yeah, he thought sarcastically, that was _much_ better.

"And you made it clear you didn't want to hear it," he countered, then yanked out another shard. "That looks like the last one."

"Good." The mercenary started to stand up, only to be forced down by arms that were stronger than he expected. He could have easily overpowered the Doc, but decided to stick around and see what he wanted. "What?"

"I still have to disinfect that," he reminded him. "And I also need to check out that other wound on your forehead. At least I know you didn't get a concussion, if you're still aware like this."

Even Jayne wasn't exactly sure what he mumbled under his breath as he sat back down, but he knew it was insulting. The Doctor grabbed some sort of alcohol wipe and ran it over the tiny cuts. Jayne hissed, but even he knew that pain meant the disinfectant was working. It was certainly less painful than pulling out the glass had been. When that was done, the Doctor laid a patch of gauze over the affected area and taped it down.

"Keep that in place for the rest of the day," he ordered. "I'll change it in the morning."

Jayne grunted and gave him a reluctant nod. The Doc seemed to know what he was doing.

"Where the hell'd your sister learn how to do that, anyhow?" he asked as the Doctor started poking at the welt on his head.

"I'm not entirely sure," he answered. "She was away at an Academy for seven years, so I'm guessing she learned it there. Before she left, she was only interested in dancing."

"Like a ballerina?"

He nodded. "How swollen was this when you woke up?"

Jayne arched an eyebrow. "Hell, I dunno. Didn't check."

"It's gone down from when I saw it last night, so it's probably healing. It should be gone in a couple days."

That was good news. At least the little ninja girl hadn't given him any permanent damage. That didn't mean he wasn't still harboring a grudge. "She went from bein' a dancer to knockin' the _go se_ outta strangers?"

"River was a prodigy growing up," he revealed, and Jayne didn't miss the fact that he seemed much more willing to brag about his sister than to talk about himself. "It wasn't just dance. Reading, writing, drawing, music, math... it all came as easy to her as breathing does to us. She even started correcting my spelling when she was three."

He barely managed to conceal his surprise at that. Was she made in a gorram lab or something? He sneered to hide the fact that he found it more interesting than he was willing to admit. "You sure like havin' a captive audience, don'tcha?"

"Well, I'm finished checking your wounds, so there's no real reason for you to stick around any longer," the Doctor replied calmly, not even fazed by his rudeness. "And besides, you're the one who asked."

Jayne scowled. Damn Doctor was right. He did find the conversation to be a little bit interesting, but only in the way that he would research an enemy to know their weaknesses. He didn't rightly trust the Doc, and especially not his little demon sister. They seemed like trouble, and he was going to be glad when they got to Persephone so they could dump them off and keep the money.

"Got better things to do anyway," he grumbled, not even thanking the Doctor as he lumbered out of the Infirmary. He turned left toward the stairs, and nearly bowled into the tiny dancer that had handed him his _pi gu_ the night before. "_Ai ya_! Watch where you're goin', girl!"

"I was," she answered in an infuriatingly calm voice. "You shouldn't let your thoughts wander so much. Might lose them."

Jayne sneered at her. "Sounds to me like you've already lost yours, girl. If ya ever had any to begin with."

"Mine don't struggle to swim in alcohol," she rebutted. "You should drink less. Makes you less likely to lose fights to little girls."

"Don't go tellin' me what to do," he snarled threateningly. "Only reason I haven't twisted you into a pretzel yet is 'coz you paid us more money than we've seen all year. But I promise you, if you try an' fight me again, I ain't afraid to hit a child."

She tilted her head to the side and examined him quizzically for a moment. "Afraid to admit you don't want to, though. Rather everybody see you as a big tough mercenary. Don't want them to know you have a heart."

Jayne took a step back. "What the hell are you on about, little girl?"

"Afraid to use her name. Give everybody nicknames because you don't want to get too close. Promised yourself you'd leave this crew the first chance you got, but you've been here nine years and you still haven't found something better. You feel like you belong here."

The girl had officially crossed into creepifying territory. "You been spyin' on me?"

She shook her head. "No. Jayne is more transparent than he realizes. Does a bad job hiding how he really feels."

"Yeah, well, _girl _needs to stop bein' so gorram creepifyin'," Jayne shot back, trying to figure out how the girl knew so damn much. She was wrong, of course, but it still creeped him out that she thought she knew him so well. Girl had to be a spy or something.

"Not a word."

Jayne raised an eyebrow. "Huh?"

"Creepifying. Not recognized by any known dictionary."

"Well maybe I just made it up," he replied, trying not to think about how this conversation had taken such a strange turn. This girl was weird. "Maybe Jayne's smarter than you realize."

"Or he's more stubborn."

He scowled. "Whatever. Outta the way. I never got to finish lunch." He shoved his way past her and started clambering up the stairs. As he climbed, he tried to keep himself from thinking that the girl had actually been right on a couple points. He didn't like her, but it wasn't too absurd to suggest that he was making a bigger deal out of this than he needed to. Of course, she still knew too damn much for her own good.

"_Gorram_ creepifyin' girl," he muttered just to be stubborn.

* * *

Author's Notes: I was going to wait until Monday to post this, but in the spirit of Christmas, I'm updating early. Hope you guys enjoy it.

My goal with this chapter was to focus on the viewpoints of everybody who isn't Simon and River. I tried to tailor the narrative in each scene to fit the way that particular character sees the world, to develop a unique voice for them that I can use later on. However, writing seven different viewpoints tends to take up a lot of space, so the rest of the crew got shunted into the next chapter.

I don't think I need to tell anybody about the reference to another show that features Summer Glau. While I'm trying to keep her somewhat close to her canon personality, River's characterization is taking a few cues from everybody's favorite cyborg. The Academy has had four extra years to mess with her, after all. That said, we'll be seeing some classic River in a couple chapters. Another thing to notice is that she's basically acting like Simon did in the pilot, drawing everybody's suspicion by being so closed off and abrupt. We'll see if that suspicion is justified later on.

Just so nobody complains to me about the yeast infection thing: I'm aware that it probably isn't true. However, Jayne is _not_ aware of that, and it's reasonable to think that Simon is simply messing with him like Inara was about glass drilling through his skull. He did once lie to him about breaking his spine on the show, after all.

Oh, and Dobson's back. I actually kind of liked Dobson, despite the whole threatening Kaylee and River thing. He's just so endearingly dorky before he gets desperate, and it's obvious that he's way out of his depth on _Serenity_. I wanted to use his incompetence in an amusing way instead of a threatening one, so I made him Alecia's bumbling partner. I'm keeping him consistent with what we saw in the pilot, since I haven't read _Those Left Behind_, in which he supposedly gets a cybernetic eye and has his motive changed to revenge. Awesome as that sounds, it's not going to apply to my version of him. Writing dorks is fun.

The next chapter is the last that I have written, so I'm going to wait a whole week to post it. I can't say how long it will be until I write the next part after that, but I do plan on continuing this at some point.


	3. No Questions Part III

The hover car slept peacefully in _Serenity_'s cargo bay, unaware that it was being observed by a pair of warm brown eyes. The eyes examined it hungrily, admiring the smooth silver curves that had been machine-sculpted for maximum aerodynamic efficiency. It was beautiful in its simplicity, with no unnecessary parts or decorations hanging out to keep the vehicle from slicing through the wind like a very sharp sword. The eyes knew that underneath a small panel at the front there was an absolutely beautiful engine, one that hummed its own special tune as it carried the car through the sky.

A tongue swept over soft lips as the eyes lit up with eagerness. Strong legs propelled them closer to the car, and a curious hand reached out to touch it, to make the illusion real. Humans and hover cars were both just parts, but what made them special was how those parts combined and worked in tandem to make them into something more. Just as the soul animated the body, machines had an aura about them that gave them an identity all their own.

Fingers touched metal, tentatively at first, then with more passion. A palm joined the fingers, and the whole hand slid lovingly along the smooth metal frame. They parted like lovers after a long embrace, and lips parted to reveal a row of perfect teeth. The mouth opened and a single word escaped her lips.

"Shiny."

"You like it?"

She gasped and stood up straight. The voice was unfamiliar, but unlike the car, she was not immediately eager to learn its identity. She turned around slowly, and discovered to her infinite relief that the sight before her was almost as beautiful as the car.

He was dressed expensively, well-groomed and looking like the proper owner of the vehicle she had just been admiring. His face was attractive, though she sensed a bit of shyness behind his eyes. He was staring back at her, examining her just as intently as she was looking at him. They said nothing for several moments until she smiled and took the first step.

"Hi," she greeted, stepping forward and extending a hand. "I'm Kaylee."

Something flashed in his eyes when she told him her name, but she couldn't determine what. Her people-reading skills were not as advanced as her mechanical ones.

"I'm Simon," he replied, taking the hand and giving it a good shake. His grip was stronger than she would have guessed from looking at him, and she knew the same thought was on his mind as she squeezed with barely a fraction of her plier-strengthened might.

"This yours?" she asked him, pointing over her shoulder at the beautiful machine.

"Um, yes," he answered, forcing himself to be confident. Kaylee wondered if he was this nervous around people in general or just her. She hoped it was the latter. "Yes, it's mine. Got us here in one piece."

She raised an eyebrow. "Us?" She fervently hoped that the other person was not attached to him. She was thinking about keeping him for herself.

"Me and my sister," he clarified. Thank Buddha. "She's wandering around here somewhere," he continued, looking through the door that led to the common area. "We're passengers."

"Really?" she asked, smiling widely. Kaylee liked passengers. "Where y'all headed?"

"Persephone," he answered. "We ran into a little trouble on Osiris and we need to be away from the Alliance for a while."

Kaylee chuckled. He'd clearly never been off-world before, otherwise he would have known what she was about to tell him. "Well, Persephone ain't the best place to do that. Alliance is pretty heavy in that area, but you can slip through if you know what you're doin'." She kept grinning. "Which the Captain does."

"Well then I guess we chose the right ship," he replied with a smile of his own.

"Gorram right you did. _Serenity_'s my baby."

They continued to smile at each other.

"You're the mechanic the Captain was talking about," Simon said suddenly, just figuring out who she was.

"Yep, that's me," she answered with pride. "What'd the Captain say about me?"

"Not much," Simon answered, crossing his arms and beginning to pace. "Although he did mention that you might decapitate me if I set foot in your engine room, so I'm a little nervous around you."

Kaylee laughed so hard she doubled over. She stood up a few moments later and wiped the water from her eyes. "I ain't _that_ over-protective. 'Sides, older model Firefly like this can run with half the engine missin' for a good day or two. You'd have to go outta your way to actually hurt somethin'."

"I don't know, I seem to have a talent for making things go wrong."

"How's that?"

He gestured around them. "Well, for one thing, I'm on a ship that looks like _this_ when I rode here in _that_," he answered, pointing at the car. "They don't exactly match."

Kaylee could tell he wasn't trying to offend her, but she still had to disguise the tiny bit of hurt she felt from him indirectly insulting _Serenity _like that. "I dunno," she replied sweetly, hoping she could bring him around. "They're kinda similar if you think about it."

"How so?" he challenged.

"Well," she said, moving in a slow semicircle, "you've ridden in both." He nodded in agreement, and she grinned. "An' the GX-21 Mercury hover car uses a smaller version of the fuel cells that power _Serenity_. Not to mention just how beautiful they both are."

"Beautiful?" he repeated, like he'd never heard that word used to describe machines before. He probably hadn't, she realized.

"Yeah," she answered, coming beside him. "Look at the curves," she instructed, and waited until he did so. "Those were designed on a computer in a lab somewhere, an' they tested it in a wind tunnel to see how much resistance it'd put up against the air. What they came up with allows for optimal airflow over the body of the car so's it doesn't strain the engine too much to get you where you're goin'."

"I see," he replied, and she could tell from his tone that he already knew all that.

"But what nobody ever thinks about is how it always comes out lookin' so pretty," she continued. "Why is _that_ particular shape the best for gettin' the air to move around the body of the car? Why couldn't it be a square or somethin'?"

"Because that would be silly," Simon replied, starting to get it. "A square car would look... well, ugly. Not to mention completely pointless if you're looking to minimize airflow."

"Exactly. The frame is the exact shape it needs to be to do the job it's meant for. Same with _Serenity_. The aught-three model Firefly moved the thrusters out further away from the body so you can maneuver 'em better when you're landing. The later models moved 'em back 'cause they thought it made the ship look too big an' ugly. But that made 'em hard to maneuver again."

"So you're saying that, even though they don't look similar _at all_, they're essentially the same because they're the perfect shape for what they're meant to do?"

"Uh-huh." The mechanic smiled and nodded.

"Isn't that true of all machines?"

Kaylee shook her head. "Just the good ones."

He laughed.

"So what kinda trouble were y'all involved in, if ya don't mind my askin'?

"I do mind, actually," he answered. "It's something we paid ten thousand credits to avoid discussing."

Kaylee had always wondered what it felt like for those people in old cartoons when their eyes bugged out so far they seemed ready to pop out of their sockets. Now she knew. "Musta been some serious _go se_ y'all got into if you're payin' that much."

"Yes," he confirmed, his eyes suddenly distant. "Very serious."

She was two steps away from him before she realized she was backing away slowly. "Y'all didn't... _kill_ anybody, did ya?"

"What? No!" he answered a little too quickly, though he could have just been surprised that she'd asked that. She wasn't certain. "No, of course not. Something happened and we need to get away from the Core for a while. River suggested this ship."

"River?" she repeated, guessing that was the name of the sister he'd mentioned earlier. "That's a pretty name."

He smiled. "Yes, I suppose it is. I was never sure why my parents chose it. But it describes her well enough."

"She your only sister?"

Simon nodded. "She's always meant the world to me. It was her idea to leave, and I just... followed. The last seven years I've found out what I would do without her, and that's not something I want to go back to. She's the most important person in my life."

"Well that's sweet," she said, grinning. He was getting more appealing by the second. "It's too bad y'all won't be stayin' with us for long."

"Yes, it's a tragedy," he remarked with a smile of his own.

She moved closer to him. "Guess we'll just have to make the most of it."

"Yeah," he breathed, apparently unsure of how to react to her as she came within inches of him. Everything in her body was screaming at her to pounce on him and take him right then and there, but the rational part of her brain reminded her to take it slow and wait until they were in her bunk before tearing off that expensive suit. This close, she could almost _taste_ him. She was preparing to grab him and lean in when...

"Kaylee!"

The mechanic jumped and quickly moved away from her intended prey, who was still frozen and uncertain about what to do. "_Soh ya fei tian_," she muttered under her breath before turning around to glare at the intruder.

Mal didn't seem very aware of the fact that he'd just ruined a special moment. He would pay for this.

"Kaylee, you mind tellin' me what you're doin' down here talkin' to passengers instead of up in the engine room where I pay you to be?"

"Sorry, Cap'n," she replied quietly. "I was just askin' Simon here about that sweet hover car he rode in on."

"Yeah, we all know machines get you hot, now get back to work," he ordered, glaring at her with those Captain's Eyes. Kaylee felt the blood rush to her face even as her heart plummeted into her stomach. She couldn't bear to look at Simon, who by now was probably staring at her like she was a circus freak. Stupid Captain. She started to obey, walking past him towards the common area.

"That wasn't very nice," she heard him say, and her heart leapt back to its original spot. She turned around to see that Mal had fixed his glare on Simon instead.

"Ain't no contract says I have to be nice," the Captain rebutted, crossing his arms. "Got a problem in my engine room and there's only one person on this boat who can suss out what it is."

"Then it seems to me like you should show a little more kindness to that person," Simon argued, standing his ground just as effectively. "She's not going to be able to figure the problem out very well if you make her cry."

"You see her cryin'?" Mal countered, jerking his head towards her. "Now, I can be a little mean sometimes, but Kaylee's a big girl, she can take it. You ain't on my crew so I don't expect you to understand that. Which means I _don't_ appreciate you questioning my orders when you're just a passenger on my ship." He stepped closer, trying to intimidate the other man.

Simon didn't flinch. "Passenger or not, I won't stand by while you treat her like that. She doesn't deserve it."

Her head flicked back and forth between the two of them as they battled over who had the right idea about her. She loved the Captain like a father, but she waskind of angry with him at the moment and Simon had a hell of a point. Of course, he didn't see how Mal treated her the rest of the time. If he had, he would have understood that he was just a little frustrated with her, and this was how Malcolm Reynolds dealt with frustration when it came to people he wouldn't allow himself to hit.

"I don't let anybody tell me how I'm allowed to treat _my_ crew," the Captain said firmly. "Especially people I don't know. I don't care how much you paid me. _Nobody_ tells me what do to on _my_ ship."

"You're kind of a control freak, aren't you?" Simon observed, breaking through Mal's anger for just a moment.

"What?"

"I'm not as good as River when it comes to figuring people out, but I think I know why you're so uptight about other people telling you what to do," he explained, and Kaylee had to cover her mouth to hide her smile. "You have a problem with authority, but when it comes to people questioning yours you suddenly get up in arms. You don't like to live by anybody's rules but your own, and when someone suggests that there might be another way of looking at things then you don't know how to handle it."

Mal shrugged. "Sounds like a fair assessment to me. What's the problem?"

"The problem is that everybody is eventually wrong. If you can't let yourself listen to other people when that happens, you aren't doing anyone a good service. Least of all yourself."

"And what would you know about admitting you're wrong?" the Captain challenged.

"A lot more than you, apparently," he answered. "River said you named this ship after your biggest failure. Now I don't know what that was, but I wouldn't be stubborn enough to name a ship after the lowest moment in my—" His next words were cut off by a fist that connected with his jawbone, sending him to the floor.

Kaylee gasped and threw her hands over her mouth. She looked at Mal, who was staring down at the other man like he was fixing to kill him. After a few moments, he looked at her.

"Fine," he muttered, and she had to struggle to remain standing under that gaze. She had no idea how Simon had stood his ground so easily. "Fix the engine room whenever you feel like it." His glare softened a little bit. "Sorry I yelled at you." He stormed up the catwalk and out of sight.

As soon as he was gone, Kaylee rushed over to Simon, who was nursing his jaw where the fist had connected. "Are you okay?"

He grimaced as she helped him sit up, but nodded. "I should be fine. It's not the first time that's happened to me." He stood up fully. "How about you?"

"Oh, I'll be just fine. Thanks for that, though."

Simon nodded. "He had no right to treat you like that."

She smiled and shook her head. "Oh, that's just Mal. He can be a big meanie sometimes, but he's got a good heart. He's nice to me most of the time and he doesn't try an' take advantage like some other captains would. He treats us all like family."

"Hitting and verbal abuse," he remarked, smiling as well, but a bit more sardonically. "Just like a real family."

"Speakin' o' which, we oughta get you into the Infirmary," she suggested. "Get 'Nara or Zoë to look at that."

Simon laughed. "I should be fine. I don't feel any fractures and I can still speak normally, so it should only be bruised at worst. Besides, I was just in there picking the glass out of Jayne's head."

She raised an eyebrow. "You a Doctor or somethin'?"

He nodded.

"How'd Jayne get glass in his head?" she wondered. "Or do I wanna know?"

"We met at a bar last night," he revealed as they walked toward the common area. "He and River got into a fight and she broke a glass over his head before knocking him out. I didn't realize he was part of this crew until we got onboard."

"Is... _that_ River?" she asked, pointing to a small, pretty little waif who disappeared into Shepherd Book's room. She wondered why she would go in there, but decided not to question it.

"Um, yes," Simon answered, evidently just as confused by River's choice in destinations.

"An' you said she beat up _Jayne_?"

He nodded.

"How drunk _was_ that ape?" she wondered aloud.

Simon laughed. "Enough that he insisted she was a robot sent back from the future."

Her eyes widened. "That'd be pretty cool," she admitted.

"Yes, well, I can confirm that my sister is one hundred percent human," he told her as they reached the stairs leading to the upper decks. "At least I'm pretty sure."

She chuckled. "Well, it was nice meetin' you, Simon, but I'd better get to work on whatever it was the Captain wanted done in the engine room so's we don't all end up driftin' in space forever."

"Okay," he agreed, watching her as she started ascending the stairs. Kaylee climbed them with an extra bounce in her step, reaching the top in no time and heading through the hallway that led to the engine room. She spied Jayne sitting in the Mess and sent a snicker his way, and she could tell that he knew she'd heard the news. He snarled at her and she giggled, skipping off to the engine room.

Once there, she tried to figure out what the Captain thought was wrong. After a few minutes of searching, she determined that _Serenity_'s engine was in peak condition, just like she'd left it. She wondered why Mal had called her up here.

Then she remembered what she'd been doing when the Captain walked in, and a mischievous smile spread across her face. Was the Captain... jealous? She knew he would never try and take advantage of her in that way, but the man treated her like a daughter and he could be very protective of her. He certainly seemed angrier at Simon than her, and had even apologized for treating her the way he did. Had the whole thing been a ruse to keep the young Doctor away from her?

She smiled and shook her head. Mal was an honorable man in his own way, but he had a little trouble letting go of things he found precious. He'd once told her that she was the only bit of pureness left in the 'verse, and she saw that he tried to preserve that as best he could. He might have thought that Simon was trying to defile that purity, but the truth was that Kaylee hadn't been "pure" since the day they'd met, when she was on her back underneath the Captain's old mechanic. It wasn't the first time she'd done that either.

She paused. That had to be a new record for her as far as trying to seduce an attractive guy she'd just met. She wasn't a huge tease or anything, but Kaylee usually preferred to wait a little while before jumping a guy's bones. The previous record was Bester, whom she'd barely met when he mentioned that he was a highly-paid mechanic working on a Firefly. She had always wanted to see one, and things had kind of gotten out of her control from there. That experience had led to her becoming the new mechanic, and some of the best moments of her life had been spent onboard this ship.

Still, it was odd that her thoughts had seemingly gone straight from getting to know Simon to wanting to drag him to her bunk and have her way with him. She did know that his hover car was the most beautiful thing she'd seen since _Serenity_. Maybe engines really _did_ get her hot.

Kaylee chuckled quietly to herself as she pulled out her toolbox and decided to check on _Serenity_ again, just in case something _did_ need fixing. That _was_ what the Captain paid her for after all. She hummed to herself as she went to work.

This was turning out to be a _very _good day.

* * *

The Shepherd closed his Bible when he heard the door slide open, and tried to contain his surprise when he did not recognize the person stepping into his room. She was small, apparently a teenager, though he knew looks could be deceiving. He guessed that she was no older than twenty-one. Her hair was dark and flowing, totally unrestrained. She wore a dark blue dress, elegant yet practical at the same time.

All of that was simple observation that was gathered in a moment by force of habit. The more important details, like her name and what she was doing in his room, had yet to be ascertained.

He noticed she was walking into the room with purpose, as her expression did not indicate that she was simply wandering around. He could guess what she was doing on the ship; he himself had been a passenger once upon a time before deciding that his mission had called him to this crew. He still hadn't moved out of the passenger dorms, citing lack of space in the crew bunks as his reason. He was not unused to passengers coming to him for various reasons, though he usually had the pleasure of meeting them first.

"May I help you?" he asked her in a calm, grandfatherly tone that he adopted when meeting new people. He found it helped to make a good first impression.

The girl ignored him and started looking around his room, her eyes darting every which way but with a definite order and purpose. He recognized the way she was taking in every bit of information and storing it for later analysis, because he'd been trained in the same technique a long time ago.

"Few possessions," she muttered suddenly, still scanning the room. "Only necessities and a couple tokens of sentimental value. No faith in the material." She looked straight at him in a way that was slightly unnerving. "Helps keep you holy."

Her statement was logically correct, but also odd. It certainly wasn't an observation one tended to make toward people one had just met. He filed that away for later consideration. "Well yes, I suppose that's true," he replied in the same tone as before, trying not to let her strangeness affect him. All of God's children were unique, after all, and He loved every one of them. "On a ship like this it helps to travel light."

"Carrying more than enough baggage already," she said, and he tried to decipher her meaning. "Nowhere to unload it and not enough room to carry much more."

The Shepherd squinted with consideration. He could tell that she wasn't meaning to be rude, but her lack of regard for proper etiquette was at odds with the high class dress that she wore like a second skin. That pointed to some serious developmental issues, most likely taking place during her formative years. That observation was also filed away for later analysis.

She made eye contact with him again, and he found himself made slightly uncomfortable by the way she seemed to be staring directly through him. She tilted her head to the side and looked somewhat curious at first, then just a tiny bit embarrassed.

"Apologies. Introduction takes place before information exchange." She extended her hand in a not-quite-natural motion. "River Tam."

He reached out with his own hand in reply, and they shook in greeting. "Derrial Book."

"Now we are introduced," she stated, as if it meant something to her besides the obvious.

"Yes, we are," he replied cautiously. "What brings you to _Serenity_?"

"Trouble," she answered, standing still. "Masquerade was broken and the animal unleashed. Needed to get away from the dog-catchers."

"You ran into some trouble with the Alliance, then," he concluded, understanding the basic meaning behind her answer even though the actual events were still a mystery.

"Yes," she told him. She nodded a second later, slightly off-cue. "Researched the Captain. Learned that he prefers to avoid Alliance if possible. This makes him the perfect choice."

Book resisted the urge to frown. He recognized the logic behind her statements, and knew that if he were on the run from an enemy, his first act would be to seek help from someone who shared his concern. He knew that the Captain was a veteran of the Unification War, and that he had taken the loss far more personally than most. His hatred for the Alliance ran deep, and if one wanted to avoid their patrols, _Serenity _was the best ship they could hope for. The fact that it was a Firefly and therefore had plenty of crawlspaces large enough to hide a human being—especially one of her small stature—made it even better.

All of that was ignoring the most concerning factor, however. "What kind of trouble are you in?"

"Prefer not to say," she answered. "Said too much already."

Book nodded, understanding. If she wanted to keep what happened private, that was her decision. But that brought up another question. "I'm guessing what you just told me is more than you've told the rest of the crew." Even though what she'd told him didn't amount to much.

"Yes," she confirmed. "You're under oath to keep it secret. Wrath of God will befall you otherwise."

He raised an eyebrow and leaned back just a little bit. "Is this a Confession?"

River nodded.

That was very odd. He knew that his reputation preceded him with passengers on this ship, but that she had come to him for this before she even knew his name was something that made very little sense. He knew the Lord worked in mysterious ways, but occasionally the mystery became a bit much for Book to handle. He sighed.

"Well, it's not much of a Confession if you don't confess anything," he told her with a smile.

"Already confessed. Words are there, can't pass through filters without getting modified. Meaning is only apparent if one possesses the necessary knowledge."

Which she hadn't given him, Book noted to himself but decided not to say. However, he decided that it didn't matter what he knew. God understood the girl perfectly, and that was enough.

"Are you traveling alone, River?" he asked her just as the question occurred to him.

The girl shook her head. "Brother. Simon. Separated by The Black, mirror must have been shattered before I left. Thinks of himself as protector; doesn't realize how much protection he needs."

It took him several moments to decipher what that meant. Book understood by now that River was speaking in metaphors, though the exact reason why was still a mystery. Was she deliberately trying to obfuscate the truth even as she confessed it to him? Or was that simply the way she always talked? Once he let himself shift his perceptions, the meaning came easily.

"You didn't see each other for seven years," he translated, to which she nodded. "And he doesn't recognize how much you've grown up."

"Partially. He sees that I am older, but has trouble adjusting his own behavior. He still sees me as his little sister."

He nodded, understanding somewhat. "And you believe that this is negatively affecting him?"

River shook her head. "Insistence on observing everything as it used to be is a symptom, not the disease. He sees the woman but speaks to the girl. Disassociation with reality can only point to a deeper problem."

"I agree," he replied, wondering if her brother would be more straightforward if he were to speak with him. "Has he sought professional help?"

"Didn't seek it. Found him anyway. Kept away from society, world was replaced with white walls and prying questions. Left alone with his thoughts and allowed to burrow deeper into his hole. Now he does not remember the Sun."

"An asylum?" She nodded, and he sighed. "When was he released?"

"Yesterday. Forced back into a world of black ties and fancy dresses, where status is everything and rules are silly and arbitrary. Tolerated it at first, but found it emptier than a black hole. Doesn't think he's leaving anything behind."

Book frowned. She was being unusually forward with this information, though she had already made it clear that she expected him to keep this secret. Still, she didn't seem to be confessing any sins. He had another question.

"Which one of you is in trouble?"

She blinked, but did not reply. He did not press the matter.

Before he could ask another question, the door slid open again. This time the face was one he recognized.

"Dinner's ready," Zoë informed them, then left just as quickly. If she wondered at all what the two of them were doing in the same room, she did not ask. As soon as she left, River looked back at him.

"We will continue this discussion later," she said formally, then followed Zoë out the door.

Book bowed his head and sighed. He had encountered all sorts of mysterious people in his life, and he had more than a few secrets of his own that the rest of the crew was still not aware of after four years. But something about this girl was different from the other mysteries he'd encountered. She not only hid what she didn't want revealed, but her motives for being there in the first place were unclear and elusive. She talked to him as though he should already know all of that, even though they had just met.

The Shepherd closed his eyes and began a prayer, asking the Lord for guidance. When that was done, he stood up and made his way out of the room and up the stairs leading to the dining area.

* * *

The meal was standard protein supplements, made slightly more edible by the addition of flavors that reminded Zoë of the process used to make dog food. She had learned to accept the taste of it early on in the war, though a small part of her still missed her mother's home cooking. She had never appreciated it enough to learn how to make it, and thanks to the war, that opportunity was now lost forever. Still, as with everything else in her life, Zoë accepted what she could get without complaint. Life was too short to waste on coveting things one couldn't have.

That was what separated her from the man sitting at the head of the table, who had gone through the same war and come out of it a different man. He was a dreamer, always pushing forward and chasing the impossible. She knew that the reason he kept flying was not because of the numerous enemies he had accumulated or the fact that he simply liked being in The Black, but because his spirit would not allow him to settle down in any one place. It was what made him a great leader: he was always going places where people could follow. And he never left anybody behind.

That was the reason she stayed loyal to him, Zoë supposed, even though her heart belonged to another. The bond that she and Mal shared went beyond that of a man and a woman. They had experienced the worst of the war together and come out of it the other side still standing. The fires of conflict had forged them into the people they were today, and made them impossible to separate. They weren't soul mates, but rather kindred spirits. Wherever Mal led, Zoë followed. As it always had been, and as it always would be.

Zoë let the thoughts come freely to her even as the conversation around the table continued. Meals were a time for reflection, to come together over the most basic of human needs and share each other's presence. Tonight, they had two new members to celebrate.

"So... you were pulling in a hundred and seventy thousand credits a year, working in one of the largest and fanciest hospitals in the Core, and then you just quit and decided to head to Persephone?" Wash was asking beside her. "What happened?"

"I really don't think it's that important," Simon insisted, taking a sip of his drink. It was mostly the same as the gruel they were eating, but modified with calcium and other essential vitamins and minerals. She could tell he was trying very hard not to spit it back out.

Zoë agreed with her husband that Simon's presence here was odd. He had been a highly respected Doctor four years earlier, and now he was leaving all that behind to try his luck with the rest of the 'verse. Of course, he had given them something resembling a hint earlier, when Jayne was trying desperately to cover his bruised ego. Said mercenary helpfully reminded them of it a moment later.

"He gof roct uf, 'member?" he mumbled before swallowing the piece of protein that was mangling his words even further than he already did on his own.

"Could you _not_ give us a fully illustrated tour of how the human digestive system works?" Wash pleaded, though she noticed that his eyes continued watching Jayne, who took another bite and began chewing with his mouth open in response.

"Jayne," Mal snapped as though he was going to take the rest of the meal and shove it where it ultimately ended up anyway. "I will not have you eating like an ape at this table. You're scarin' the women."

"Oh, so Wash is women now?" the mercenary replied with a devilish grin. Zoë bored into him with her eyes to advise him against saying whatever he planned to say next. "What? He's the one who said somethin'."

"I was _concerned_ for _Kaylee_," the pilot explained in a tone meant to make him appear valiant, though Zoë noted that the mechanic's eyes had not left Simon since she sat down next to him. The girl was crushing on him something fierce.

"Whatever," Jayne replied with a shrug, and went back to devouring his meal.

"Doc already said he didn't want to discuss why he got locked up," Zoë reminded her husband, then looked at the Doctor. "Though I _am_ curious why you'd choose this ship."

"Well, I've already told this to some of the crew, but it was River's idea. She researched a number of ships and their crews before deciding on this one. We were looking to avoid any Alliance patrols."

"Don't usually get stopped by Alliance anyway," said Mal. "Though I'm sure you know it happens occasionally."

"That's why we gave you extra incentive," River explained in a tone that Zoë wasn't entirely sure was natural. "Keep the Authorities at bay and you'll be well-rewarded."

Mal laughed. "Well, y'all didn't have to pay me so much to steer clear of Alliance. Lookin' to avoid them anyway."

"It also ensures that no one on board will ask questions," she added coldly, glaring at Wash.

"Hey, I just wanted to know," he said, throwing his hands up in a surrender position and revealing his secret weakness to death glares. Zoë recognized the glare River was using as a slightly less intense form of the one she'd given Jayne. That girl really didn't want them to know what happened.

Zoë figured that whatever they were running from, it was probably River's fault. She didn't seem all there in the head, and her moods alternated between aloof and openly hostile. Still, they had taken worse passengers on board, and Jayne was always there to make everybody look better by comparison. She could tell by the way Simon interacted with her that he loved her unconditionally, and the fact that he had followed her onto this ship meant that there was nothing he wouldn't abandon for her sake. On some level she admired that, but the cynical part of her mind wondered just how much the girl was manipulating that trust.

She kept those thoughts to herself. It wasn't her place to judge, and Simon seemed happy. She could only hope that he didn't wind up being played for a fool.

"Well, everybody's running from something," opined Inara, who hadn't spoken up until then. "You wouldn't be the first person from the upper class to come onboard this ship."

"Always wondered why you stayed on my boat," Mal replied. "Not to mention why you came on in the first place."

"That's something _I'd_ rather not discuss either," she answered, injecting just the right amount of weight into her voice to indicate that she wanted him to drop it. "And I told you why I came here the first day we met. You help me expand my client base, I help you with matters of respectability, and that helps me save money renting the shuttle."

"Still don't answer why you'd hang out with us lowlifes," Jayne cut in. "'Less, like you said, you're runnin' from somethin'."

"You guys aren't lowlifes," Inara insisted, gesturing around the table. "And besides, you're _much_ more interesting to hang around than the circles I used to be in. I get to be honest with you."

"That how come you ain't tellin' us why you came onboard?" Mal rebutted before stuffing a spoonful of protein into his mouth. She glared at him.

"It's not like I'm the only one with secrets," she snapped back. "I'm sure everyone would _love_ to hear what really happened with _Saffron_."

Mal immediately assumed a defensive posture. "Hey, that was _years_ ago, and as I recall, _you_ kissed her too."

"It was years ago when I came onboard too," she pointed out, and let it hang there.

"I'm sorry, did I miss something?" Simon spoke up from the other end of the table.

Kaylee grinned and started to explain the story to him. "Oh, a few years back, when we were on the Triumph settlement, Cap accidentally got married." She giggled.

"Really?" He looked at Mal with mischief in his eyes.

"I was drunk, and that was _not_ a normal marriage ceremony," Mal insisted. "I thought she was just givin' me a hat made of flowers an' letting me drink some wine. Wasn't till she showed up in my cargo bay that I found out what was goin' on."

"She ended up not being who she said she was anyway," Zoë volunteered, backing up Mal. "She got on the ship and pretended to be some naïve little village girl, then she seduced Mal and knocked him out with a special chemical spread on her lips."

"Good Night Kiss," Simon realized.

"Exactly," said the Captain. "And I would just like to remind everybody that _I_ was the victim, and that I did _not_ try an' take advantage of her in any way."

"You 'fraid of the preacher's special Hell?" asked Jayne.

"_Ab_solutely."

"So what happened after that?" the Doctor asked.

"She got on the bridge and tried to do the same thing with me," Wash answered. "But since I'm happily married to _Zoë_ here," he continued while wrapping an arm around her, "she had to kick me in the head. After that she crossed the drive connectors and set us on a course for some scrappers. Then she fused the bridge doors shut and tried to steal one of the shuttles."

"Where I tried to stop her," added Inara.

"That when she kissed you?" Mal asked.

"That's between me and her," she replied with a smirk before looking at the rest of the table. "She did have Companion training, though. And we did end up getting out of that one alive." Everyone except Simon and River nodded in agreement.

And just like that, Inara had deflected Mal's question and led the conversation in a completely new direction, managing to make most of them forget what they had been talking about in the first place. Zoë had always been suspicious of that ability, but she didn't resent the Companion for it. People used the tools at their disposal. Inara's conversation skills were the best on the ship, rivaled only by Shepherd Book.

The preacher had been unusually quiet, she noticed. She hadn't asked what River had been doing in his room because it wasn't her place, but she wondered if whatever they were talking about was the reason he was simply observing the conversation instead of diving in as he usually did. He wasn't making it obvious, but Zoë could tell he was deep in thought about something. She wasn't going to bother him about it.

"So, what was it like growin' up?" Kaylee asked Simon, giving all of them something new to focus on. This whole thing had started when the mechanic had asked him what it was like being a Doctor. "I always wondered what life was like on a Core planet."

"Well," he said, looking at her, then at the rest of them. "I remember there was a lot of pressure. Pressure to succeed, to become a brilliant Doctor. Most of that time is a blur for me. I was always studying, trying to be on my best behavior. The only times I really remember clearly are when I was playing with River."

"Aw, that's so sweet," she cooed, and Jayne started pretending to choke himself. River, who for some reason had decided to sit next to the burly mercenary, put a stop to it when she punched him in the arm. Hard.

"Ow!" He recoiled, leaning away from her while she glared at him with the white-hot fury of a thousand tiny suns. "The hell was _that_ for?"

"Being an ignoramus."

"A _what_?"

River started listing synonyms. "Fool. Doofus. Moron. _Ben tian sheng de yi dui rou_." Jayne's nostrils flared at the last one.

"Hey!" The admonishment came from Mal, who was glaring at River like he was prepared to bend her over his knee and spank her. "I don't care if that's partly true, that's still no way to talk about my crewmembers. Apologize."

She glared right back at him. "Or what?"

"Or you get to have soap for dinner instead. Nobody talks like that at the dinner table, and I mean _nobody_."

"You do sometimes."

"Only when the conversation is especially heated," he protested, not even seeming to remember that this was the first time she'd ever had dinner with them. Zoë wondered how the girl seemed to know so much. "That's still no excuse to call Jayne a stupid inbred sack of meat."

"Yeah," the mercenary agreed. "Hurt m' feelins an' such."

"Is River picking on you again, Jayne?" Zoë teased. "I can have a talk with her brother, you know." Next to her, Wash giggled.

Jayne snarled in response, but said nothing else.

"River, you need to apologize," Simon implored. "What you said wasn't very nice."

"Neither was trying to asphyxiate himself in order to draw attention."

"Yeah, that _was_ kinda rude," Kaylee agreed.

"Just 'cause you're sweet on him don't mean ya have to waste _our_ time," the mercenary grumbled. "Save it for when you're lyin' awake at night with your hands 'tween your nethers."

Kaylee's face came to resemble a strawberry, and River moved to punch him again, but Inara caught her elbow and gripped it tightly. Mal smoldered at Jayne like he was ready to throw him out the airlock.

"Leave this table," he ordered in a low, no-nonsense voice. "Right now."

Jayne sneered at him for a moment, then picked up his plate and slammed it down for effect. "Weren't hungry anyway," he growled before rumbling off.

* * *

The rest of dinner was carried out in silence. Kaylee left immediately after she was done, running off to her room while trying to hold back tears. Simon and River left shortly after that, settling into their own dorms. Book and Inara made their way to bed as well, and Zoë stayed behind in the Mess to do the dishes. Wash gave her a kiss and headed onto the bridge, where Mal followed. None of them said a word.

"So... what do you think happened back there?" Wash asked, breaking the silence that had endured for at least twenty minutes.

"Ain't rightly sure," the Captain responded, staring out into The Black. "Knew it was a mistake to bring those two on board."

"Then why did you?"

"They paid well," he answered. "We've put up with worse for a lot less than ten thousand credits. Hell, I don't think we've ever done a job that paid that much."

"So you got greedy?"

"Well it ain't like they're tearin' up the ship. Had to knock some sense into the Doc in the cargo bay, an' that nutty sister of his caused a little trouble at dinner, but that's nothin' we ain't dealt with before."

Wash frowned. Mal seemed to be ignoring the biggest issue with the two of them. It wasn't that he was personally opposed to them staying. Wash only flew the ship, taking it wherever the Captain pointed. He knew he didn't have a say in who was brought onboard. However, he was able to recognize patterns. What happened at dinner was the most distressing part. It wasn't the worst they'd ever been through, but Wash was not a man who liked seeing the people whom he'd come to consider his family fighting with each other. He was going to be relieved when they reached Persephone so that they could just drop them off and enjoy the money.

And there was one thing he'd forgotten to mention. "What about the fact that they want to avoid the Alliance?" he asked. "Do you think they're fugitives?"

"Wouldn't be the first time I harbored fugitives on my boat," he replied calmly. "And I ain't gonna pry. Way I figure it, we're all runnin' from something or another."

Wash nodded, deciding to drop it. If the Captain wanted to take that risk, that was his decision. He would do his best to accommodate him.

A couple of sensors suddenly beeped, and Wash was on them immediately, analyzing data and trying to determine what they were squawking about.

"Proximity alert," he concluded after a moment. "There's a ship gaining on us."

"Who?"

"It looks like..." Oh, no. It couldn't be. The universe wouldn't hate them that much. "_Zao gao_."

"Speak of the Devil and he shall appear," Mal recited, understanding what the sensors were telling him just as well.

Another series of beeps sounded. "They're sending a wave."

"Answer it."

He pressed a few buttons and then slid out of the chair. Mal took his place.

"Firefly _Serenity_, this is Agent Dobson of the Allied Planets. You are ordered to stop your engines and prepare for boarding."

Mal assumed a mocking grin, which Wash recognized as the expression he used to stall people. He pressed a button on the panel. "Well hello there, Agent," he greeted in a voice that sounded just friendly enough. "I thought we were done talkin'."

"You did not have permission to leave Osiris. Halt and let us dock with you. We need to ask you a few more questions."

"Well now, nobody told me I couldn't take off," he replied. "Seems to me you shoulda mentioned that if you didn't want me leaving."

Dobson's face managed all sorts of gymnastic feats as he struggled to reply to that. "Yes, well... I..."

"Move aside."

He did so, and the face on the monitor was replaced with a younger, female one. "Hello, Captain Reynolds."

"Uh, hi there." Mal seemed unsure of how to react. "What can I help you with?"

"I apologize for my partner's incompetence," the woman told him. "I would have gone to question you myself, but I had another case that needed my attention."

"Well, sorry about that, but your partner never told us not to take off," he replied. "I'm a busy man, got lots of people that need their cargo delivered."

"Speaking of cargo, that's what I need to talk to you about. Slow down and prepare for docking."

"Well now, I don't see any reason we need to do this face to face," Mal told her. "I'm a reasonable man. You just ask your questions and then everyone goes home happy."

"I'm afraid I can't take your word on things, Captain Reynolds," she said coldly. "We'll need to inspect your vessel to ensure you're not carrying anything illegal."

"Hey, I already explained to your partner there, if I had anything illegal onboard I'd know about it."

"And I'm not as dumb as him," she snapped. "Do you know what kind of ship this is?"

"Can't say I do," Mal answered, even though the display was already telling him everything about it down to the number of bolts.

"This is an Alliance Gunship," the female agent explained. "And there's a Cruiser not far from here that I can signal to rain hell down on you and your entire crew for refusing to participate in a simple inspection. Stop your engines, and let us dock."

Mal's smile disappeared, and he shifted into the mood he adopted whenever things turned serious. He let go of the console for a minute and looked at Wash. "Go get Zoë an' Jayne, tell 'em to get their asses into gear. Tell Kaylee to go into the cargo bay an' put a tarp over that shiny hover car, then get back up to the engine room in case we need to go full burn. And make sure our new passengers stay in their rooms."

Wash didn't move for a second. "Captain, what are you doing?"

He didn't answer, turning back to the screen instead. "Alright," he said, his voice deadly serious. "Go ahead and board."

* * *

Author's Notes: This marks the last of the pre-written chapters. I don't know when I'll get around to continuing this story, but I hope it's soon because it was extremely fun to write. I just have some other things going on in my life that I need to take care of right now.


	4. No Questions Part IV

"Be careful," Alecia told her partner as they made their way through the airlock. "Captain Reynolds has a bit of a reputation when it comes to defying authority."

"I'd expect nothing less from one of the last holdouts of a losing war," Dobson agreed.

"He's not stupid enough to go for the armed approach, but keep your eyes pealed for any sort of trap he might be trying to set," she warned. "I've been around enough false charm to know when someone's trying to hide something."

Dobson nodded, but said nothing further.

The door opened after quite a bit of effort, and the two of them stepped into the cargo bay of the Firefly. If they were expecting to have a wall of firearms pointed in their direction, then what actually awaited them was rather disappointing.

"How's it goin', Officers?" Malcolm Reynolds asked in his most casual tone. "Wish you'd given me time to prepare a proper welcome."

Alecia resisted the urge to roll her eyes at the remark, instead scanning around the bay. She saw no immediate evidence of smuggling, but that was like taking a single glance at the outside of a brothel and proclaiming there were no whores inside. As with many things, she would have to look underneath.

To the Captain's left and right were what she guessed was hired muscle, though the woman on the left seemed to radiate a stoic professionalism that seemed vastly more dangerous than the ape to the right. If things turned south, Alecia had no doubt she would be the quickest to pull out that Mare's Leg she kept strapped to her hip.

"It's no trouble at all, Captain," she returned after only a moment spent gathering those details. "Just allow me and my partner here to make our inspection and we'll be on our way."

Reynolds' mouth twisted up in a smirk and he gestured between Alecia and her partner. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but... didn't there used to be more of you?"

"You lifted off in such a hurry that we didn't have time to requisition the standard four man attachment," she answered before Dobson could rise to the bait. "Not that we'll be needing one, since you don't plan on giving us any trouble, _right,_ Captain Reynolds?"

"Wouldn't dream of it."

"Good," she replied, stepping forward. "Now, it's been brought to my attention that you lifted off from Persephone just as Federal Marshals were about to board your vessel. Am I correct?"

Reynolds nodded. "I was doin' it on account of the Companion who rents my shuttle. She had an engagement on Osiris that required the utmost urgency."

She glanced at Dobson, who confirmed it. He had already filled her in on what Reynolds had told him, but she had her own thoughts on the matter.

"I remember being introduced to Miss Serra at the party last night," she replied, frowning. "Funny thing is, those invitations weren't sent out terribly far in advance."

"That so?" the Captain asked, hooking a thumb in each of his pockets and looking awfully nervous.

"It is. Persephone and Osiris are about two days apart, and I only received my invitation on the day of the party. Which was very fortuitous, since I was already there trying to track down your ship."

Reynolds appeared to consider that, but didn't answer. She glanced briefly over at the man-ape, who was mouthing the word "fortuitous" like it was the greatest mystery in the universe. Alecia continued.

"Face it, Captain Reynolds: your Companion only took that engagement because you were already on Osiris, not the other way around. That means you had some other compelling reason to be in the Core."

His face twisted into a look of confusion as a sudden thought appeared to cross his mind. "Rewind back to the part where you were at a fancy party with Inara?"

Alecia rolled her eyes in disgust. "I come from a well-off family and happened to be personally acquainted with the guest of honor. I don't stay in this uniform all the time, you know." She frowned, wondering why she was getting so defensive to a man she only knew from files. She then remembered what those files said about his tendency to use obfuscation and evasion to draw attention away from things he'd rather avoid discussing. That mostly took the form of acting like a naive idiot when his track record showed he was anything but.

"Anyway, we're getting off track. If you're hiding anything on your ship, Captain Reynolds, now would be the time to come forward with it."

"I believe I already told your partner there about the Geisha Dolls."

"Very cute. Alright, let's get down to business: what's under that tarp?" she questioned, pointing to the covered mass she'd just spotted. She sincerely hoped Reynolds wasn't stupid enough to hide his cargo under a sheet, but she had seen some pretty idiotic stunts pulled in her time.

"Oh, that," he responded, and immediately she noticed the look of worry that spread across his features. "Just a transport. We keep her covered so she doesn't get all... dusty."

"Would you mind lifting it up for us so we can see?" It wasn't actually a request, but she hoped that maintaining some semblance of politeness would keep things from turning ugly. She was able to handle herself if they did, but there was nothing wrong with wanting things to go smooth.

"Uh, yeah, we can't."

She raised an eyebrow threateningly. "Why not?"

"'Cause we... can't," was his expert rebuttal.

Alecia narrowed her eyes and stepped closer to the Captain. Even though he dwarfed her in terms of height, she had more than enough authority to put him away for life if she felt like it. "Captain Reynolds, I don't know what kind of game you think you're playing," she began menacingly, "but the war is over. You don't get to tell us no when you don't have an entire resistance backing you up. Surrender implies submission, and you submitted a _long_ time ago. Now show us what's under that tarp."

The smug look on his face immediately gave way to the one he'd flashed her just before allowing her to board his ship, and she could tell that he was trying very hard not to murder her where she stood. Alecia could tell that she'd hit a nerve with those remarks, but she'd gotten very good at pushing people's limits without actually driving them over the edge. At the moment, Reynolds was still calm enough to remember that she could bring an entire galaxy of _go se_ down on him if he stepped out of line.

He was just about to answer her when an alarm sounded and a frantic voice shouted over the intercom: "_Mal, need you up here, NOW!_"

There was only a second's hesitation before Captain Reynolds began darting up the stairs, followed by his two compatriots. Alecia stood there for a moment in shock before snarling and charging after them.

"Captain Reynolds!" she thundered as she chased him up the catwalk, already plotting his demise. He disappeared around a corner, climbing up into the crew corridor and heading for the bridge. Alecia scrambled after him, while Dobson had tripped and was picking himself up. When she got to the bridge, she found herself staring down the business end of a lever action rifle that the woman had drawn and was now using to keep her at bay.

"Wash, this had better be damn important," Reynolds was saying.

"Got more visitors, Captain," the pilot said nervously. "And I don't think they're half as friendly."

"What do you mean?"

"Reynolds!" Alecia shouted, interrupting the exchange. "I guarantee you _nothing_ is going to be as unfriendly as what will happen if you don't tell your crewmember here to _lower her weapon_! One call from me and an Alliance Cruiser will be here to—"

She was cut off by the sound of the woman cocking her weapon.

"Quiet, please."

Alecia frowned, but shut up all the same.

"Now tell me Wash, what's so concerning about our new guests?" asked Reynolds.

"Well, for one thing, they're flying a Trans-U. Nobody runs those anymore."

"Not that many people run Fireflies anymore. What's your point?"

"They're giving off radiation," Wash replied, looking concerned. "A lot of it. It's like they're running without core containment."

Reynolds' eyes widened immediately and he glanced out the window, though whatever had spooked him wasn't yet in visual range.

"_Ta ma de_," he whispered, and there was no mistaking the feeling of dread behind those words.

* * *

Simon was returning from the restroom and making his way back to his room when he ran into Shepherd Book, whom he'd been introduced to at dinner but hadn't actually spoken with at all. He moved to the side to make room for the other man, only for the Shepherd to mirror his movements. They kept up this awkward dance for a few more seconds before Simon finally chuckled and moved all the way to the wall.

"Sorry about that," he said. "The bathroom's free if you need it."

"Oh, that won't be necessary," he replied. "I was actually..." He let out a subdued laugh. "I was actually going to see what was so important that the Captain wanted us all confined down here."

That would explain the sneaky look he'd caught on the man's face for a single moment when he'd first run across him. "A Shepherd, spying?" he questioned semi-accusingly, though he couldn't quite keep a good-natured smirk from appearing on his face.

Book laughed. "Even though I'm a man of God, I must confess that occasionally my curiosity gets the better of me. It's probably just as well that you stopped me."

"Oh, by all means, go ahead. I'm sort of curious myself."

The Preacher shook his head. "I'm used to the Captain's secrecy by now. If it's important, he'll tell us."

"I guess so," Simon replied warily. "Do you mind if I ask you something?"

"Of course not," the Shepherd answered. "I'm always here for people when they need me."

"Earlier I saw River going into your room," he began.

Book nodded to confirm that the event in question had indeed taken place.

"What did you talk about?"

The Shepherd frowned. "I'm not entirely certain, and I don't know how much I should tell you, since most of it was spoken in confidence. I will say that she wasn't very forthcoming."

"What do you mean?" Simon asked, following the Shepherd's lead by frowning as well.

"I'm not sure if she was being deliberately obfuscating or if that's simply the way she talks, but I couldn't get a straight answer out of her," he explained. "She mentioned something about one of you being in trouble with the Alliance, though I couldn't discern whom."

Simon was silent for several moments. "Something happened just before we had to leave Osiris. Something bad. I don't remember much about it, and River won't even tell _me_ what happened, much less this crew."

"I see," Book replied, crossing one arm over his chest and lifting the other up to his chin. "I don't want to presume anything, but..."

"River's not the reason we're in this mess," he insisted defensively. "I just woke up and..." He stopped, knowing that if he went any further he would probably reveal more than he wanted to. "And it had already happened. She wasn't the one responsible."

The Shepherd raised an eyebrow. "Does that mean you were?"

"I don't remember. One second I was heading to my room and the next..." Before Simon could finish, they both turned their heads to hear something bellowed from the cargo bay.

"Captain Reynolds!"

Simon squinted and cocked his head. Something about that voice sounded very familiar...

He was about to go over to the cargo bay to find the source of it when he felt a tugging on his arm and turned around.

"Simon," his sister whispered from where she held him. "Captain said not to move. We must hide."

"I was just going to..." he began, but stopped when he heard boots stomping on the catwalk. "Yeah, let's hide."

* * *

"Drop the weapon!" Dobson shouted as he finally appeared in the hallway and leveled his sidearm at them.

He was met with the sound of two pistols cocking as both Reynolds and the man-ape to his right pulled out their own weapons in response. Alecia frowned.

"Agent Dobson, lower your weapon," she ordered.

Dobson scowled at her. "No offense, Agent Chen, but you're not my commanding officer, and you don't get to decide how I approach a hostile tar—"

"LOWER IT!" she shrieked, and a moment later he acquiesced. "I don't want anybody shooting each other before we've had the chance to figure out what's going on. Captain, tell your crew to lower their weapons as well."

"Or what?" Reynolds challenged rather smugly, and Alecia fought the urge to groan.

He knew what she hadn't said—hadn't needed to say, really. He and his crew had three weapons trained on her and her partner, while Alecia hadn't even had the opportunity to draw her sidearm yet; and she knew for a fact how poor of a shot Dobson was. He also had superior knowledge of the environment, and while she had a passing familiarity with Fireflies, they were notorious for being supremely customizable. That was another reason smugglers preferred them.

He and his crew had them dead to rights. That was why she was opting to wait until they were back on board their own ship before escalating the violence.

Not that she was going to let Captain Reynolds know that.

"Or we get to waste time while whatever it is you've spotted gets closer, and from the way you reacted to it I can tell you don't want that to happen. So lower your weapons and let's deal with this situation like reasonable adults, _dong ma_?"

He hesitated for a few moments, but eventually he lowered his antique pistol and slipped it in its holster, then motioned for his crew to do the same. The ape did so somewhat reluctantly, while the woman simply holstered her weapon without complaint. She didn't stop staring at her, though.

"Okay," she breathed, letting the tension flow out of her. "Now would you mind clarifying for me what that was all about?"

"Oh, that?" He gestured to the display. "Nothin' special. Just a merry bunch of cannibalistic space pirates who wanna eat us all and use us as ornaments for their hull."

Suddenly his terrified curse made sense. Not that she particularly believed him. "You mean Reavers?"

He nodded grimly.

"You're lying," Dobson decided, getting halfway through the motion of raising his sidearm again before Alecia shot him a glare. "If I had a credit for every time somebody gave me the Reaver excuse, I wouldn't have to work another day in my life."

"Yeah, 'cept it ain't an excuse," the man-ape piped up. "I seen what they've left behind. Stuff o' nightmares."

"Jayne's right," Reynolds confirmed. "We've run across more'n a few abandoned ships got hit by Reavers. Not a sight for someone with a weak stomach."

Alecia frowned again, remembering her own inability to keep her lunch down when she'd witnessed the atrocities supposedly committed by the Reavers. Still, they were just stories, right?

"What were you doing on those ships?" she inquired.

Reynolds hesitated for a moment before going back into Stupid Captain mode. "Well, we were, uh... lookin' for survivors. Never found any. Reavers are pretty thorough."

"And did you take anything off those ships? Food stores, maybe?"

"Not a crumb," he insisted.

He was lying. Illegal salvage was one of many operations that smugglers preferred. Nobody left alive to get between them and the goods. He apparently seemed serious about the Reavers, though.

"How do you know they're Reavers, anyway?"

"Well," he answered, pointing to the display. "They're givin' off all sorts of fun radiation. Alpha, Beta, Gamma, the whole spectrum. That only happens if you've got a leaky reactor, or you never bothered containing it to begin with."

"You'd have to be suicidal to run that hot," observed Dobson.

"Exactly," said Wash. "Reavers aren't known for being terribly sane. The reason they don't bother with containment is because they're kinda... what's the word I'm looking for?"

"Irreverent?" suggested Jayne, to the surprise of everybody on the bridge.

"Yeah, irreverent when it comes to their own flesh. They like to stick iron rods through their skin. Mutilate themselves. Something that does that isn't gonna care if they die of radiation poisoning."

Alecia remembered hearing that about Reavers in the stories she'd been told. They couldn't actually be true, could they?

"The other reason is they're usin' a ship that don't run no more," Reynolds continued. Trans-Us stopped officially running sometime last century, and even people who use Fireflies found 'em obsolete ten years ago. But Reavers'll take whatever they can get."

"I see," Alecia practically whispered. "I... I've heard stories, but... I never believed they were true."

"Well, tell me, Agent," Reynolds began, pointing outside the cockpit. By this time they were coming within visual range of the ship, and she let out a horrified gasp when she saw it. "Do you believe the stories now?"

* * *

"Scylla and Charybdis," River babbled, staring at the wall. Simon and Book exchanged a worried glance, though neither of them could decipher what she was saying.

"What?" asked Simon, hoping she would explain.

"The Odyssey," she replied. "Route between two cliffs was the quickest way home, guarded by a monster and a whirlpool. Couldn't avoid one without running into the other. Chose the monster, got most of his crew gobbled up. Better than the whirlpool, would have gobbled up the whole ship. Should have taken the long way around."

"Huh?"

"I think she's trying to compare Odysseus' peril to whatever situation the Captain has found himself in," Book theorized, to which she nodded. "I believe the more popular saying involves being trapped between a rock and a hard place." He looked at her suspiciously. "How do you know what's going on, River?"

"Voices travel, fragments lost in the wind. They come together in my head and I sort them out one by one. Ship is smaller than it looks."

Book raised an eyebrow. "River, neither your brother nor I have been able to hear what's going on. How is it that you can?" He had some theories that would explain a lot, but he wanted to hear from her first.

"You only listen to what's being spoken, not what's _said_," she responded, placing a special emphasis on the last word.

He frowned.

"So what _is_ going—" Simon began, but was cut off by a sudden declaration from the ship's speakers.

"_This is the Captain_."

Simon and Book turned their attention to the announcement, while River stared curiously at the ceiling.

"_We're comin' up on another ship_," Mal continued. "_Looks to be Reavers_."

"_Wo de ma_," Simon breathed, while Book nodded silently. Suddenly River's reference to ancient poetry made perfect sense.

"_Could be they've just come back from a raid and they're full up, but this far into the Core I doubt it. Regardless, I want everybody to stay calm, don't panic, and hope they don't notice us._"

Book knelt down immediately and began a silent prayer, while Simon glanced around worriedly. This persisted for several minutes as each of them considered what might happen if the Reavers decided to get hungry.

Then they felt the ship jerk hard to the left, and River split the air with a terrified scream.

* * *

As soon as Mal was finished speaking, Inara sighed solemnly and rose from the couch in her shuttle, striding over to the dresser and pulling out the top drawer. Reaching in, she produced a long wooden box filled with a deep maroon liquid that rested inside a syringe. She frowned.

While an overdose of this would certainly kill her long before the Reavers ever got their paws on her body, that wasn't its primary purpose. She had developed a habit of examining it whenever trouble found them, as if it had somehow cursed her. It wasn't as irrational as she might have thought before it led to her having to leave the House Madrassa rather than face the end of her career.

There were occasions when her clients would inquire about the secret behind her beauty, which she always politely deflected as having been born with it. The truth was, it had more to do with this dark red substance at this point than any natural gifts that might have benefited her when she was younger. If anyone were to find that out, well...

It would be the end of her.

Sighing once more, she put the box away, then carefully shut the drawer. Not a moment later she was nearly pitched off her feet by a sharp shift in gravity, though her natural grace allowed her to remain standing. Then she heard a scream from down below and hurried out of her shuttle, Captain's orders be damned.

* * *

"What are they doing this close to the Core?" Alecia wondered aloud as they watched the Reaver vessel drift slowly past. "I thought Reavers only attacked border moons."

"That may have been true four years ago, but somehow they got the bright idea to start recruitin' instead of eatin' everybody," Reynolds explained. "There's more of 'em than ever."

"And they're getting bolder every year," the woman whose name Alecia had inferred was Zoë added.

"Not a whole lot of ships take this route," Wash observed. It makes the perfect spot for them to ambush whoever's unlucky enough to be traveling here."

"Which in this case would be us," Reynolds concluded. "Nothin' we can do now except hold tight and wait for 'em to pass."

"You're joking, right?" Dobson asked, on the verge of panicking. "You're really just going to let us sit here and wait for them to come on board?"

The Captain smirked. "Thought you didn't believe in Reavers."

"Well whatever's in that ship, it can't be friendly. I don't like the idea of waiting around for them to raid us."

"And neither do I, but the thing is, Dobby, that you never run from a predator."

"Triggers their huntin' instincts," agreed Jayne.

"We try rabbiting, they'll be after us like wolves," finished Zoë.

Reynolds stepped forward and laid a hand on Dobson's shoulder in a blatant show of arrogance that showed how much he thought he had the situation under control. "So why don't you just sit tight and—"

He was cut off by the right hook that slammed into his jaw, which sent him staggering back. The other three crewmembers were apparently just as stunned as their Captain, for none of them were fast enough to prevent the panicking Agent from zooming across the bridge, shoving the pilot aside, firing up the thrusters and steering hard to the left.

His moment of idiocy was short-lived, however, when Jayne came up from behind him and yanked him from the chair, then sent him stumbling across the bridge straight towards Zoë, who had drawn her rifle and used it to crack him over the head. He fell to the deck, still conscious but not in any hurry to get back up.

The scanners began howling all sorts of scary warnings about how the Reaver ship had come about and was now pursuing them, by which time Wash had reclaimed his seat. He stabbed a button on a nearby wall with his thumb, activating the intercom. "Kaylee, we need to go to hard burn."

"_What? Why?_"

"Reavers have come about and they're gunnin' for us," answered Reynolds, demonstrating a remarkable amount of calm despite the hectic situation. "We need to get outta here and we need to do it fast."

"_Got it, Cap'n_."

"Wait," Alecia cut in. "Let me get to my ship first. It has weapon systems."

"Just call in fire support," Dobson groaned now that his breath had returned to him. "From the cruiser."

She fixed him with a look that was reserved for the most spectacular of morons, though his idiotic charge towards the console did suddenly take on a new layer of sense. "Oh, _jing-chang mei yang de_, wake up! I was _bluffing_!"

"Knew it," Reynolds commented smugly, and she turned her withering gaze towards him instead.

"My ship has cannons and missiles," she explained. "Just give me one minute to detach and I can drive them off."

The Captain smiled and shook his head. "You do realize a little gunship like yours will do about as much damage as a frozen pea shooter against that Trans-U, right?"

"And what are _you_ planning to do, lean out the hatch and fire your _pistol_ at them? It's better than doing nothing!"

"We ain't doin' nothin'," Reynolds protested. "We're just runnin' away from those monsters as fast as we can."

"Which will be easier to do if my ship isn't attached to yours," she pointed out, smirking at the small glimpse of defeat she caught on his face.

"So, Captain," she continued with some smugness of her own, "what do you say?"

* * *

Author's Notes: In what seems to be a pattern for this story, I finally decided to post this once my forward momentum hit a wall and I let this sit on my hard drive for months. I've tinkered with it enough to the point where I'm satisfied with what's here, even though this chapter was originally supposed to be twice as long. I figured I'd make it more digestible.

In case it's not obvious by now, Alecia is going to be a mainstay in this series, but not on the level of the canon characters. You needn't worry about a Mary-Sue coming into things and taking over the whole story, and I hope my characterization skills are better than that. I've started to imagine her as being portrayed by Kelly Hu, if that helps anybody to picture her. I kind of like how she's developed differently from what I originally envisioned, because that means she's started to take on a life of her own. She's fun to write, is what I'm saying.

No idea when I'll churn out the next bit of this, but I'll keep working on it.


End file.
